Chapter 6

Essex was dead weight.

Clora sat frozen on the edge of the sofa, her back screaming in protest from the awkward angle. He was sprawled beside her, one arm thrown carelessly over his head, lost to the world. She couldn't move. She didn't dare move.

She held her breath, listening to the steady rhythm of his breathing. It was deep and slow, a stark contrast to the shallow, tense breaths he took when he was awake. A faint, barely audible snore rumbled in his chest.

He looked almost innocent. It was a joke. This man had destroyed her family, locked her up, and ruined her life. And now he was drooling on a throw pillow.

Suddenly, a shrill, piercing noise shattered the silence.

Essex's phone. It was vibrating violently in the inside pocket of his suit jacket, buzzing against the leather cushion. The default ringtone blared through the quiet room like an air raid siren.

Clora's heart jumped into her throat. No, no, no!

She felt Essex's body instantly tense beside her. The peaceful expression vanished, replaced by a deep, angry furrow in his brow. His hand clenched into a fist, and a low, dangerous growl rumbled in his chest. He was about to wake up, and he was going to be furious.

Panic kicked in. If he woke up now, the spell would be broken. He would remember where he was, what he was doing, and he would probably think she had drugged him or set him up. She would lose the only advantage she had ever had over him.

Without thinking, Clora acted on pure, desperate instinct. She was terrified of him waking up, of that cold fury returning to his eyes. She reached out and placed a hand on his shoulder, a clumsy, panicked gesture meant to hold him down. A low, shushing sound escaped her lips, not a gentle hum, but the kind of frantic noise you make to quiet a startled animal.

She leaned close, her lips brushing his ear, the sound becoming a continuous, low vibration. "Shhh, it's okay, just sleep." It wasn't a lullaby; it was a desperate plea born of self-preservation.

The effect was instantaneous. The tension drained out of Essex's muscles like magic. The furrow in his brow smoothed out. His fist unclenched, and his hand went slack. His breathing deepened again, and he settled back into the cushions, completely out.

Clora let out a shaky breath. Holy crap. It worked. It actually worked.

The phone was still ringing, the sound grating on her nerves. She couldn't let it keep going. She snatched it from the sofa cushion beside him.

The screen glowed in the dark room. "Alvin Mercer."

His assistant. The gatekeeper.

Clora hesitated for a split second. Answering his phone was a huge breach of protocol. It was asking for trouble. But if she didn't answer, Alvin would just keep calling, or worse, send the guards up to check on him.

She swiped the green icon and brought the phone to her ear. She kept her voice low, mimicking the groggy, husky tone of someone who had just woken up.

"He's asleep," she whispered.

Dead silence on the other end.

Clora could practically hear the gears grinding to a halt in Alvin Mercer's brain. The man was a robot, perfectly efficient and utterly unflappable. He had worked for Essex for a decade. He had seen everything.

But he had never heard anyone else answer this phone. And he had certainly never been told that his boss, the chronic insomniac who ran a multinational empire on three hours of sleep and pure rage, was actually asleep.

"Sir?" Alvin's voice was cautious, laced with disbelief.

"It's Parrish," Clora said, using the name he would recognize. "He's sleeping. The meeting is canceled."

More silence. Clora could almost smell the shock coming through the speaker.

"Miss Parrish?" Alvin asked, his voice cracking slightly. "Did you say... he's sleeping?"

"Yes," Clora said firmly. "Don't call back."

She ended the call and tossed the phone onto the far end of the sofa. She looked down at the man beside her. He hadn't stirred.

She had done it. She had put the monster to sleep, and she had shut down his right-hand man. The power dynamic in this room had just flipped on its head.

She carefully extracted herself from the sofa, her muscles aching. It was a struggle. He was huge, and she was practically crawling over him. But she managed to get to her feet. She grabbed a cashmere throw from the back of a nearby armchair and gently draped it over him.

Clora stood over him, her chest heaving. She looked at his sleeping face, then at the phone lying silent on the cushion.

She wasn't just a prisoner anymore. She was the only person in the world who could give this man peace. That made her valuable. That made her untouchable.

She had a lot of work to do.