Chapter 5
Two weeks later, the estate had settled into a new rhythm. Bane was eating regularly, his coat regaining its glossy black sheen, his ribs slowly disappearing beneath healthy muscle. He now followed Harper everywhere, a massive, silent shadow padding softly behind her. But his loyalty was fiercely divided; the moment Silas’s armored SUV pulled through the gates, Bane would abandon Harper and sit at the front door, tail thumping rhythmically against the slate floor.
Harper was in the kitchen slicing apples when the perimeter alarm suddenly blared. It wasn't the shrill, panic-inducing siren of a full breach, but a low, pulsing tone indicating an unauthorized presence at the main gate.
Vance, the head of security, immediately materialized in the kitchen doorway, his hand resting casually on the sidearm holstered at his hip. "Miss Quinn. Please step away from the windows and move to the interior hallway. Now."
"What's happening?" Harper asked, wiping her hands on a towel, a cold knot forming in her stomach.
"Someone is at the gate demanding to see you," Vance said, his face expressionless. "He tripped the outer sensors. He claims to be your fiancé."
The towel dropped from Harper's hands. All the blood drained from her face. Marcus.
"No," she whispered, her voice trembling violently. "He doesn't know where I am. I used cash. I burned my phone. It's impossible."
"He had a private investigator track the IP address of the email you sent responding to our ad," Silas’s voice cut through the room. He strode into the kitchen, wearing a dark suit, his eyes burning with a cold, lethal fire. He looked at Harper’s terrified, pale face, and his jaw locked.
"He's here," Harper choked out, her legs giving way. She grabbed the edge of the marble counter to stay upright. "Silas, he’ll kill me. He promised he would kill me if I ever ran again."
Silas closed the distance between them in three strides. He gripped her shoulders, his touch firm and grounding, forcing her to look up at him. "Look at me, Harper. You are inside my fortress. No one breaches these walls. He is a dead man walking."
"Please don't let him in," she begged, tears spilling over her lashes.
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"I’m going down to the gate," Silas said, his voice dropping to a terrifying, deadly calm. "Vance, lock down the house. If this man takes one step onto my property, put a bullet in his head."
Silas turned and walked out, his boots echoing like a death knell on the slate floor. Bane, sensing the sudden shift in the atmosphere, let out a deep, ferocious bark and charged after his master. Harper was left in the kitchen, trembling as the nightmare she had spent eight months running from finally caught up to her.
