And Felix? He was his son. Molded in that same image, nurtured by a man who knew no boundaries, who lived in the dark spaces where laws didn’t reach.
I’d stared at the screen that night, my reflection faintly mirrored in the glass, thinking—this is my future.
And my father—he knew. He always knew. He just didn’t give a damn.
Power mattered more. Strategic alliances. Political currency. My life, my body, my future—they were nothing more than leverage on his chessboard.
The way Felix spoke—oily and too familiar—made my stomach twist. Every word slithered from his mouth like he already owned me, like I was something he’d paid for and couldn’t wait to unwrap. I could still feel his gaze—slow, invasive, undressing me across the table like he was already imagining what he’d do with me once the papers were signed.
I was expected to accept it. To lie back and play my part, like a well-trained daughter at the altar of family duty.
Like hell.
Then came the final blow. Casual. Cruel. Delivered like a toast.
Of course it had been my father. Why was I even surprised anymore?
“She’s still untouched,” he’d said, as if it were some rare virtue he had personally safeguarded all these years.
He hadn’t even looked at me. Just lobbed the words into the room like I was furniture. Like it was a command he’d enforced my entire life. Because that’s what it was. A rule he’d said out loud the day I turned eighteen.Be a good girl.Yourhusband deserves a pure bride. Don’t ruin that before he gets you.One sentence that explained everything—the locked gates, the bodyguards, the rules.
No dating. No parties. No stepping outside without permission.No life.
Even when I did manage to sneak out—to a club, to a party—it’s not like I ever let anyone near me. What would be the point? Fucking someone in a bathroom stall just to spite him?
The boys from school were pathetic. Rich, preppy cowards with their father’s money and politics. They talked like their dicks came with investment portfolios. Nothing about them made me feel anything except boredom and contempt.
And the men I met through my father? Corrupt, old, disgusting. Just like him. Just like Felix.
But Maksym…
He was the first one I wanted. The only one I craved. The only man who ever looked at me like I was chaos and beauty wrapped in fire. The only one I wanted to set me alight.
I squeezed my eyes shut, shame rushing through me like a fever. My face burned. I couldn’t tell what stung more—the humiliation, or the way Maksym had looked at me after.
He was pissed. I could see it. I felt it, even across the room. And now he’d never touch me again.
I rolled onto my side, pulled the covers over my head, but it did nothing to stop the ache. It sat in my chest like a stone.
My fingers itched.
I almost reached for the pills. My mother’s little white saviors, hidden behind the drawer lining.
But something stopped me.
Instead, I reached beneath the mattress and pulled out the sketchbook. My pencil was still inside the spiral.
I didn’t think. I just started to draw. Lines. Shadows. Sharp angles.
I drew his jaw first—Felix’s. Then his nose. His eyes, too close together. I dragged the pencil hard enough to dent the paper.
I didn’t realize I was snarling under my breath until I paused to breathe.
The sketch began to twist. Not just a portrait anymore. Something darker. Something ugly.
The way I saw him.
The way he made me feel.
