Chapter 4: The Ugly Parts

MADDISON

My heart was pounding.

Like, visibly. Like it didn’t know how to calm down as he led me through his stupidly massive mansion. I followed him, Up those ridiculous stairs, down a short hallway, and finally,

To a door.

He turned the knob and it felt like my heart turned with it. And when he pushed it open, my breath froze like my lungs forgot how to do their job.

“Welcome to the Van Halen Complex,” he said like he was welcoming me into the British castle.

My entire body locked in one spot.

Mirrors instead of walls.

My eyes couldn’t keep still. They spun, circled, and tried to make sense of it.

Two walls… floor-to-ceiling mirrors, faced each other. Mirrors that reflected different versions of me. Of him. Of us. 

The rest of the room was matte black fading into shadow and a low black couch stretched along the wall. A large bed sat in the center like a stage,

I hate mirrors.

I tried to look down, tried to avoid the mirrors like that would save me. But they were everywhere. There was no escape.

“I’ve never seen this many reflections of myself before,” I mumbled.

I meant it for me, but of course, he heard.

“You’ll get used to it,” he said, like this was normal. Like this wasn’t insane.

“Most people spend their lives hiding from themselves. I prefer the truth, however distorted.”

I turned to him, needing to see his face in the middle of this madness. I allowed myself to scrutinize him now. Tall. Broad shoulders. Dark hair, tousled, missing a brush, dark beards that framed his face giving him this rugged outlook. Straight nose and full lips that looked way too kissable for a man who barely smiled.

And his eyes, stormy green eyes that dominated with just a stare.

He was handsome and he looked too damn young for his age. Thirty-nine and looking like a fine thirty with the kind of bad boy handsome that your parents warn you about before going off to college.

Damn it, Maddison. Stop eye-licking the man like he’s the last slice ofS cake.

I swallowed. “So this is your truth? A room full of…. you?”

He smirked. That rich, smug, sinful kind of smirk that makes you want to slap a man and kiss him in the same breath.

“Glass never lies. People do,” he said, walking toward me like he was daring me to resist him. “This room, my room, never betrays me. Never leaves. It reflects only what I allow.”

And just like that, I thought of Chad.

And the betrayal.

And how it feels when the person who swore they’d never leave does. When the one person you trusted… breaks you.

The bitterness was back. I swallowed it hard.

“Look…”

He raised my chin, his fingers turning me so I faced the mirror against my will. Our reflection stared back at us.

“It’s a room full of us, Maddison.”

I barely looked. I hated what I saw. The reflections felt too honest. Exposing every part of me. The beautiful and the ugly parts.

How did he do it so easily?

He must be sipping a high dose of obsession.... with himself.

He paused. Then, somehow reading my thoughts, he added with a smirk,

“You think I’m a sick, narcissistic bastard.”

But isn’t that what he was?

“Isn’t that what this is? An excessive obsession with yourself.” There was a bit of anger in my tone and I couldn’t help it.

Who the hell has mirrors in half the square meter of their room? Who builds a shrine to their own reflection?

I have had to deal with enough of mom’s narcissistic boyfriends to now have to sleep with one?

My hands curled into fists at my sides.

“This room is about power,” he said, his hand trailing lines down my arms, my body tingling at his touch. “My room is about… control. And pleasure. It’s about taking back whatever you think you lost.”

Then came the part that made my blood stop.

“Strip, Maddison. While we watch you."

Sick. Twisted.

And he waited….. damn those stormy green eyes dominating me down to a squirrel.

My hands shook. But I did it. Slowly. One strap. Then the other. No bra.

He didn’t touch me right away. Just stared, drinking in every inch of my skin like it was art.

Then, his finger traced the curve of my breast. 

I gasped.

My spine prickled with chills. My brain was foggy like it couldn’t keep up with the sparks firing through my veins. It was difficult to stay on my feet as his fingers moved in slow circles over one breast, just brushing, like he was barely even touching me. 

Then he pressed down on one nipple, pinning it there.

“Ugh!” I whimpered, my body leaning into his touch before I could even think. 

I bit my lip, a gasp snagging in my throat as he rubbed it slow, gentle… over and over… till it perked up under his touch.

I’ve been touched before. 

I’ve been kissed, held, felt up.

But never like this.

Not even with Chad.

But this man…

It felt like he knew my body and my body knew him. Like my nerves had been sleeping this whole time and just picked him to wake up for.

As if he wasn’t some stranger I just met.

His mouth found the soft part of my neck while the other hand mirrored his play.

“So beautiful,” he whispered, eyes locked on the mirror, on the reflection of those pink peaks, swollen and tender beneath his hands, like they were made for him.

Like they’d been waiting for this. For him.

“For the next thirty days, I’m going to study every inch of you. Every curve, every edge. Teach your body how to respond. Every hair on your skin will know my name. I’ll ruin you—and enjoy watching myself do it. Because in this room, I’m the center of your world.”

My eyes fluttered shut. I couldn’t take it, all that heat, all that focus. I was trembling, not just from his touch, but from how deeply my body already believed him.

And then, just as fast, he let go. My body screamed from the loss. This is what he paid for but my body was making it damn too easy for him.

“Open your eyes, Maddison. See what I do to you.”

I blinked up at him... barely, just as his hand slid down my stomach. Then lower.

His fingers pressed against the need between my thighs through the thin fabric.

My knees buckled.

He caught me. Of course he did. 

“Relax Maddison. You won’t come until I say.”

His hand slipped through the slit of my gown… found me through my panties. His fingers circled, pressed, teased the swollen tip of my sex until it began to ache.

I cried now. “Corian!”

“So sensitive,” he murmured. “You were made for this, weren’t you, Maddison?”

A strangled moan escaped me. My hips jerked, chasing his touch.

He held me steady. “Easy tiger,” growling against my ear. “I’m not done playing.”

And then, just like that, it happened.

The curse. The one thing I couldn’t ever predict or stop.

The breathless gasps turned to whimpers. The whimpers turned to muffled cries. And then.... I was sobbing.

I didn’t want to. God, I didn’t.

But the tears were already there. Loud and ugly.

He froze. His hands left me in an instant. Everywhere he'd touched now aching from the absence.

Corian reached out, cupping my chin with unexpected gentleness, turning me toward him.

“Maddison,” he coaxed softly. “Are you crying? Is this too much?”

There was no mockery. No cold amusement. No anger.

I blinked through tears, shocked by the look in his eyes.

Concern.

Actual concern.

The predator was gone. And in his place… a man who cared?

I swallowed. Hard.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I can’t control it… It just happens whenever…”

My voice cracked.

Whenever a man touches me intimately. It somehow triggers Uncle Bernie’s groping. When I was just a girl.

The shame. The memory. It all spilled.

“I can’t stop it.” My whole body shook as I sobbed.

"Come here," he said, scooping me into his arms.

He carried me from the mirror room. Through another door. A normal room. No mirrors. Just a bed and a quiet I didn’t know I needed.

He laid me on a bed and pulled me into his arms. I folded into him on my side. 

“Let it go, Maddison,” he whispered into my ear.

And I did.

I cried so hard I couldn’t breathe. Let it all pour out.

The fear. The shame. The pain. The pieces of me Chad never stayed long enough to see.

Every time this happened with him, he either blackmailed me or stormed off like I’d ruined everything.

But Corian…

This man I’d only just met…

He stayed.

Held me. Let me break apart in his arms.

I’ve never felt safe in a man’s arms… but what if he lets go now?