The Valuation of Prey
I have always found humans to be remarkably similar to market fluctuations—predictable, driven by fear, and easily manipulated if you understand their bottom line. But as I watched the security footage of the boy in the white shirt navigating the ventilation shafts of my high-security archives, I realized I had finally found an anomaly.
Rainier Callisten.
I sat in my darkened office, the only light coming from the amber glow of a glass of vintage scotch and the flickering monitors. On the screen, Rainier moved with the precision of a ghost. He wasn't a professional thief; his movements were too frantic for that. But his mind? His mind was a masterpiece of algorithmic destruction.
He had bypassed a firewall that cost me three million dollars to install in less than ninety seconds.
"Checkmate," I whispered to the empty room, watching him reach the final server.
I didn't call the police. I didn't alert the onsite tactical team. Instead, I waited. I wanted to see the look in his eyes when he realized the "Zero-Sum Game" had already begun—and that I had been the one who left the door ajar.
When my security detail finally brought him into the penthouse, he looked exactly as I expected: a fallen angel drenched in the filth of the real world.
His white shirt was damp, clinging to a frame that was deceptively lean. He was trembling, but it wasn't the tremor of a coward. It was the vibration of a high-performance engine pushed to its breaking point.
I stayed silent, letting the silence of the 80th floor weigh down on him. Silence is the best interrogator; it forces a man to face his own sins. I pretended to be occupied with my tablet, but my focus was entirely on the pulse thrumming in his neck.
One-forty beats per minute, I calculated. High. But steadying.
"Do you know the statistical probability of a mid-level analyst successfully embezzling forty-two million dollars from my private equity firm, Rainier?" I asked. I kept my voice like silk—soft, but capable of strangling.
"Zero point zero-three percent," he answered.
I finally looked up. His eyes were wide, dark, and filled with a terrifying intelligence. Most people look at me and see a bank account or a monster. He looked at me and saw an equation he couldn't quite balance.
I stood up, and for the first time, I saw him flinch. Good. He understood the scale of the predator standing before him.
As I walked around the desk, I took in the details. The way his hair was matted to his forehead. The way his fingers twitched, as if still reaching for a keyboard. He was beautiful in his desperation. It made me want to see just how far that brilliance would go if I stripped away his safety net.
"You've lost, Rainier," I murmured, leaning into his personal space. I caught the scent of rain and cheap coffee—the scent of a man who lived in the margins of the world I owned. "In a zero-sum game, for me to win my forty-two million back, you must lose everything."
I reached out, grabbing the collar of his shirt. I wanted to feel the heat radiating off his skin. I wanted him to know that I didn't just own his debt—I owned the very air he was breathing.
---
I watched his reflection in the glass of the floor-to-ceiling window. Rainier stood paralyzed, his toes curling into the deep pile of the charcoal-grey rug. He looked small in the vastness of my office—a white speck of dust in a chamber of shadows.
Most men, when they lose everything, collapse. They weep, they beg, or they go numb. But Rainier was calculating. Even now, I could see the gears turning behind those dark, intelligent eyes. He was looking for the exit. He was searching for the loophole I might have left in the three-page document currently resting in my palm.
He would find none. I had drafted that contract myself, and I don't leave loopholes. I leave traps.
"The guest suite is through the double doors to the left of the library," I said, not turning around. I enjoyed the way my voice carried in the silent room, a low vibration that seemed to physically push against him.
"You will find your wardrobe has already been updated. I've taken the liberty of disposing of your previous belongings. They were... inefficient."
"You went to my apartment?" His voice was sharp, a sudden blade of defiance cutting through the silence.
I turned slowly, swirling the amber liquid in my glass. "I own your apartment building, Rainier. Entering it isn't 'going to it.' It is simply checking on my inventory. Your books, your cracked laptop, that pathetic collection of vintage motherboards—all gone."
I saw his hands clench into fists at his sides. The anger was beautiful. It brought a flush to his pale cheeks, a spark of life that made him look less like a victim and more like a rival.
"Those were mine," he hissed.
"Nothing is yours," I countered, my voice dropping an octave. I walked toward him, each step deliberate. I stopped when I was close enough to feel the heat radiating from his agitated body. "Read the third clause again, if your memory is failing you. All personal assets, physical and intellectual, are surrendered to the Vilgoughvrum Estate for the duration of the term. You are a blank slate, Rainier. I will decide what you wear, what you eat, and what you think about."
I reached out, my fingers tracing the line of his jaw. He didn't pull away this time, but I felt the tension in his muscles, the way he braced himself for my touch as if it were a brand. His skin was like silk over steel.
"Now," I whispered, "the first rule of the game. You will never speak unless I address you first. Your voice is a luxury you haven't earned back yet. Do you understand?"
He glared at me, his eyes screaming a thousand insults. But he didn't speak. He bit his lower lip—a habit I was quickly becoming obsessed with—and gave a sharp, jerky nod.
"Use your words, Rainier. Just this once. Confirm your understanding."
"I understand... Master Vilgoughvrum."
The title tasted like poison in his mouth, but it felt like wine in my ears. I felt a surge of dark, possessive heat in my gut. This was why I hadn't turned him over to the authorities. A judge would have given him twenty years; I intended to give him a lifetime of exquisite subjugation.
I gestured toward the doors. "Go. Bathe. Eat. I have a data set waiting for you in the morning that would break a normal man's mind. I expect you to have the projected yields mapped by sunrise."
He turned and walked toward the doors, his bare feet silent on the floor. He looked fragile, but I knew better. He was a weapon I had just unboxed, and I was eager to see who he would draw blood from first—me, or the world.
---
Three hours later, I sat in my library, the lights dimmed to a soft, golden hue. I should have been sleeping. I had a merger meeting with the Singaporean delegates at 6:00 AM. But I found myself staring at the closed-circuit feed on my private monitor.
Rainier was in the guest suite.
He hadn't touched the dinner I had sent up—a perfectly seared Wagyu steak and a bottle of wine that cost more than his father's annual salary. Instead, he was sitting on the floor by the window, his knees pulled to his chest, staring out at the city lights. He had changed into the silk lounge-wear I'd selected. The deep emerald green of the fabric made his skin look like alabaster.
He looked like a masterpiece in a gallery. My gallery.
I leaned back, watching him. I found myself dissecting his movements—the way he ran a hand through his dark hair, the way he leaned his forehead against the cold glass. He was mourning. He was mourning the life he had lost tonight, the simple, boring life of a genius hiding in a cubicle.
I pulled up his file on the secondary screen.
Name: Rainier Callisten
Age: 24
Graduated Summa Cum Laude from MIT at 19.
Disappeared from the academic circuit for two years to care for a sick sibling. Re-emerged as a low-level data analyst for Vilgoughvrum Financial.
He had hidden his brilliance. He had purposefully underperformed to stay off the radar. If he hadn't tried to move that forty-two million, I might never have noticed him.
*What a waste that would have been, I thought.
I tapped a command on my keyboard, activating the intercom in his room. I didn't say anything. I just wanted to hear him breathe. The audio was crisp; I could hear the slight, ragged catch in his throat. He was crying.
Quiet, dignified tears. The kind of crying that came from a man who knew he was trapped but refused to scream.
I felt a twinge of something in my chest. Not pity—I am incapable of that—but a sharp, piercing curiosity. I wanted to go to him. I wanted to wipe those tears away with my thumb and then bite the skin where they had fallen. I wanted to break him until the only thing he could cry for was me.
"Rainier," I said into the microphone, my voice a low rumble in his quiet room.
On the screen, he jumped, his head snapping toward the hidden speakers. He looked around wildly, his eyes wet and shining in the dark.
"The steak is getting cold," I said. "Eat. I don't like my assets to lose value due to malnutrition. If that plate isn't empty in ten minutes, I'll come in there and feed you myself."
The look of pure, unadulterated loathing he gave the camera was the most honest thing I had seen in years. He stood up, wiped his eyes with the back of his hand in a defiant swipe, and sat at the table. He began to eat, his movements robotic and angry.
I smiled.
He was perfect. He was a storm trapped in a bottle, and I was the one holding the cork.
This wasn't just a contract. It wasn't just about the money. This was the first time in thirty-four years that I felt truly awake. The game was on, and for the first time, I wasn't sure if I wanted it to end.
I turned off the monitor and leaned back in the darkness, the silence of the penthouse suddenly feeling alive. Tomorrow, I would begin the process of dismantling him. I would take his logic, his pride, and his brilliant mind, and I would weave them into the fabric of my own life until he couldn't remember where Rainier ended and Devillione began.
In a zero-sum game, someone has to lose everything.
And I had never been a loser.