Chapter 4
Ivy's POV
The alarm shrieked in the morning. I hadn't moved yet when Tessa slammed her hand on it for the third time and yanked my blanket clean off.
"What time do you think it is?" She stood over me, hands on her hips. "Everyone else is already up, but you're still here sleeping like some kind of princess."
I sat up slowly, my body stiff from cold. "I'm sorry. I'll get up now."
"Out until God knows what hour last night, probably doing things you shouldn't be doing." Her voice rose with each word. "Dressed like you crawled out of a dumpster. And you still don't have a phone—do you know how annoying that is? Every time someone needs you, one of us has to waste time hunting you down to deliver messages. You make everything harder for everyone."
My hands trembled as I reached for my shoes. "I'm sorry."
She grabbed her jacket and stormed out, slamming the door hard enough to rattle the walls. I sat there in the freezing room, pulling on my oil-stained work shirt with numb fingers. Even through the thin walls, I could hear voices—low murmurs and occasional laughter that cut off when footsteps passed. People were talking about me.
By ten in the morning, I'd been scrubbing pots for hours. But today was different. The other workers kept glancing at me, their whispers following me everywhere.
Margaret, a middle-aged server, sidled up to me at the prep station. "Ivy," she said in a low voice, "have you ever had a boyfriend? Did you really meet someone last night?"
I shook my head, keeping my eyes down.
Before she could continue, Garrett burst through the door, his face tight and anxious, his eyes refusing to meet anyone else's. He grabbed my arm without a word and started pulling me toward the exit. "There's a customer asking for you specifically."
"But it's not even lunchtime," Margaret called after us. "Who would be asking for her now?"
Garrett didn't answer, just kept walking, pulling me along. His palm was slick with sweat against my arm, and his steps were unusually quick, almost frantic. My heart began to race. This wasn't a normal request. This was something else entirely.
He led me all the way to the lodge's front entrance. A man stood waiting there, wearing a perfectly tailored black suit, his dark hair cut short and precise. His deep gray eyes swept over me with cold assessment before he turned to Garrett.
"This young lady no longer belongs to your establishment as of today," he said, his voice cool and professional. "Don't ask questions you shouldn't ask."
Garrett opened his mouth as if to speak, but the man had already gestured toward the parking area outside. Two large men in black suits stepped forward, their hands closing around my arms with bruising force.
They dragged me toward a black luxury sedan and shoved me into the back seat. The door slammed shut, the engine started—
Then something hard struck the back of my head, and everything went black.
When I woke, everything was wrong.
The ceiling above me was impossibly high, decorated with intricate English molding. A crystal chandelier hung in the center, scattering light across walls covered in dark wood paneling. The room smelled faintly of fir and musk, and though the temperature was comfortable, it leaned slightly cold.
I was lying on an enormous bed with deep gray silk sheets, still wearing my oil-stained work clothes. One of my shoes had fallen off. My throat burned—a slight searing sensation from stomach acid that had come up while I was unconscious. My mouth tasted bitter and wrong.
I sat up quickly, too quickly, and had to grab the edge of the mattress as the room spun. This wasn't the lodge. This wasn't anywhere I recognized.
Moss-green velvet furniture sat arranged around a fireplace. Turkish rugs covered polished hardwood floors. High ceilings, dark refined wood trim—everything screamed wealth from another world entirely.
I slid off the bed on unsteady legs, my eyes scanning the room frantically. There—a single heavy door, firmly closed. I crept toward it as quietly as I could, not daring to open it, and pressed my ear against the wood to listen.
Did they make a mistake? I thought desperately. Why would they bring me to a place like this?
Voices came from just outside. Male voices, speaking in low tones.
"Mr. Green, should we tie her up?" The speaker sounded young, uncertain. "What if she wakes up and tries to run?"
"That won't be necessary." The response was calm, professional. "She's here to help calm the young master. We don't want to frighten her more than necessary."
A pause. Then: "But what if she refuses to cooperate?"
Two seconds of silence. When the man spoke again, his voice was perfectly level. "She doesn't have the right to refuse. I'll go in and handle the situation shortly. You and the others just make sure she doesn't leave this floor."
I stepped back from the door, my hand pressed over my mouth to muffle my breathing. Help calm. Young master. Handle the situation.
My brain couldn't make sense of it. Young master—like something from a historical drama, except this was happening now, to me. Why would they use such an archaic title? Had they mistaken me for someone else?
But it was the word "handle" that made true terror spike through my chest. Images flashed through my mind—everything I'd heard whispered about humans who disappeared into vampire estates. Drained until there was nothing left. Transformed into mindless ghouls. Sold to underground blood markets where they were kept in cages and systematically bled dry.
The nightmare was getting worse. I backed up until I hit the wall, my legs threatening to give out, barely able to keep myself standing.
