The Grey Man's words kept echoing in her head like heated metal. He knows everything, he had said.
There was no escaping that sentence, spoken with the calm precision of someone who already holds the proof.
Naiara sat on the edge of the bed, her hands clasped tightly in her lap, replaying every glance, every silence of the past weeks.
The man she thought was Leo.
The trust that had shattered in her hands.
She who, like a fool, hadn't noticed anything and had even made love to him.
A suffocating wave of shame and pain crawled through her chest.
She had been deceived by the man she loved and sold by her own father like an object.
Her heartbeat thudded so violently that she could feel it in her throat.
The door opened, soundlessly.
He entered, immaculate, the same way he had appeared at dinner: controlled steps, perfect suit, a shadow following him like a cloak. He didn't speak.
He sat in the armchair, one leg crossed over the other, watching her.
His face was unreadable, but his eyes, those impossible, cold grey eyes, burned with a steady, dangerous light.
She challenges him: "I want to know what you know."
Something flickered in his eyes: interest, amusement.
He leaned slightly forward, his tone unhurried.
"Undress."
"How, excuse me? You can forget it!"
He smiles. "Do you want to know the truth? Undress and you'll have it."
Her pulse roared in her ears. The request wasn't about her body, it was about control. About breaking her spirit in plain sight.
He realizes that she is clenching her fists. "Oh, come on strawberry... Don't make me play the mother's card in danger. Be good. You don't have to break, you just have to bend."
Naiara feels the anger mounting and then exploding. She throws herself towards him with her hand ready to slap him, her hand reaches a centimeter from his cheek but the gray, without moving a millimeter, with an inhuman snap, and does something that, unconsciously, makes Naiara tremble: he turns her hand and places a sweet, patient, but possessive kiss on the inside of her wrist. "You don't bend, right, strawberry?"
Without letting go of her wrist, he gets up from the chair and she is forced to raise her head to be able to look at him.
He is very tall, only his physical presence could bring anyone to their knees.
He moves forcing her to walk backwards, until he pushes her against the edge of the bed, making her sit down.
He still pushes her making her lie down on the mattress.
Naiara feels her breathing speed up, her throat burns as if it were incandescent.
He gets dangerously close to her lips, but in such a sexy way that she feels ashamed just to think about it.
So he, in her mouth says: "Get undressed strawberry, or I'll do it." The gray suddenly comes off and returns to sit on the armchair as if nothing had happened.
Naiara rose shakily, fury and shame burning through her. And then she saw it, the visible reaction beneath the fabric of his tailored pants.
She realizes the effect she causes in him, a man so arrogant, so bad that he seems to be touched by nothing, a man without emotions.
He immediately notices that she has noticed the bulge in his pants, but without hesitation or embarrassment he says: "You can see the effect you have on me... and me? What effect do I have on you, strawberry?"
She is intimidated, embarrassed to death, scared and angry. A mix of emotions that makes her head spin. "I hate you," says Naiara with clenched teeth. "I hate you with all of myself."
He smiles. "Do you know the difference between hate and love? None. They are two sides of the same coin, strawberry. Undress now, otherwise I'll come and check the effect I have on you."
Naiara turns red and he laughs heartily, then he nods at her, as if to say "go on" and she, trembling, begins to undress.
She drops the straps of the dress and slides it to the ground, leaving her only with her underwear on.
Instinctively Naiara covers herself with her arms.
He grimaces with his eyebrow and gets up, approaching her dangerously, like a ferocious beast preparing to attack the prey. He caresses the features of her body with the back of his fingers. "Such a beautiful body, perfect in its imperfections" he says, caressing the scar on her belly, "It must never be hidden, never."
He looks into her eyes, in those big, chocolate-colored eyes, then bends down and kisses her on the neck.
Naiara's body wakes up at that touch giving her goosebumps that becomes evident and he, promptly, notices it. "You see, strawberry, that's the effect I have on you. Now dress up."
Naiara snaps nervously, for something unfinished, for something she can't even explain and says, angrily: "Now tell me what you know!"
He, quietly, sits down and says: "Of course, you did what I asked you and you were good. Ask me what you want and I'll answer you. Do you remember? I never lie."
She looks him straight in the eyes but those gray eyes instill fear, make her tremble, out of fear for sure but also for something else. "Tell me about who betrayed me and how they did it."
The gray bursts out laughing, a loud and tremendously threatening laugh. "Your beloved Leo and the hated twin, Damian. Let's start with them, strawberry. When you know the truth, my home will no longer seem like a prison to you."
The laughter lingered in the room long after he had stopped speaking.
And in that moment, Naiara understood that knowledge, real knowledge, could be far more terrifying than chains.