This is not a love story. This is a story of a kidnapping, of holding someone against their will in a glass tower. There is a prince: handsome, bad-tempered, arrogant. Untouchable, safe within his magic and his glass tower. Daniel Everwood has everything he could ever need -- power, control, a tower of shimmering glass, even a friend. The fact that he cannot touch people has never truly mattered.
Until he meets Eren.
For the first time in his life, Daniel can touch someone. Simple contact becomes obsession. And obsession becomes a crime.
Eren never asked to be special. To him, his difference is a curse. The last thing he ever wants is to wake up imprisoned in a glass tower, the captive of a man with too much power and too many secrets. He has a life waiting for him -- a mother, a girlfriend, a future he refuses to lose.
Escaping should be simple. Except the closer Eren gets to freedom, the harder it becomes to ignore the unsettling truth: maybe Daniel isn’t just the villain he’s supposed to be. Maybe he is a victim, too, his heart as fragile as the glass magic he wields.
And maybe, just maybe, neither of them will leave unchanged.
"You can't keep me in here forever," Eren snapped despairingly. "You know that, don't you? I can't live like this forever. You have to either let me go or kill me. And I think it's more than likely you'll kill me ..."
"There's no need to get dramatic," said Daniel approaching the glass partition. "Come then, Eren, let's dance."
Before Eren could react, the glass withdrew and he was in Daniel's arms. He stiffened and tried to pull away but the grip on his wrists were far too firm and Eren, though no weakling, found it impossible to fight. "You're as stiff as a board, what's wrong with you?" His breath was cold and smelled of the mint from the green salad.
"You've got a hand on my shoulder and another on my a -- "
"Lower back and if you say anything else, I'll pinch you," Daniel warned and when Eren looked up quickly he realized there was laughter in those grey eyes. Daniel was laughing at Eren's discomfort, but it wasn't a cruel laughter. It seemed teaching Eren was something he enjoyed and suddenly Eren smiled. Up close, Daniel didn't look any more human, he was still too pale, his skin too perfect. Eren could see faint veins below the surface and the grey irises of Daniel's eyes. It was unnerving. But Eren's heart was beating hard, and he felt a little light-headed. He hadn't felt this nervous on his first date.
"There," said Daniel with a flourish. "That's better. You should smile more often."
Eren wished Daniel would smile more often. It helped him look human. But as he studied Daniel, he had to know.
"Why did you have to take me?" Eren asked softly. "Why ..."
"Would you have come with me if I'd asked you?"
Eren thought about it honestly, standing stiffly in the middle of the sitting room in the hands of the Ice Prince. "Not when I knew you like that ... but maybe ... if I’d known you longer, if we’d become friends."
"But mostly now," Daniel pointed out carefully. "I don't do friends, Eren, I don't do people. I wanted to touch you so ... that was all I could do."
"You could have asked."
"Eren, you'd have run screaming if I'd --"
"You were a creepy stalker parked outside my house."
Daniel didn't answer for several seconds and Eren wondered if he'd angered him. "Perhaps I did come across a little too strong."
Eren snorted instead of answering since he saw little point in agreeing to the obvious. But he could see a contrast in Daniel, the arrogant ass who he met outside and the person before him, showing off, feeding Eren, trying hard to please him.
"How ... how did you become the way you are?" Eren asked finally. "You told me you weren't always a mage like this ... what does it mean?"
"You really want to know?" Daniel gave a wry smile. "It's not something I'm proud of. We all mess up."
"But I told you about my family," Eren pointed out. "And Annabelle."
"I didn't know we were doing some fair-trade agreement," Daniel said withdrawing a little.
"But I want to know," Eren told him gently and was surprised that he really did want to know. He was curious as to what had made the Ice Prince into what he was.
"What can I say, it's just me." There was a bitterness in his tone and Eren realized they were not moving and the music was coming to an end.
"I --"
A sharp knock made both of them stiffen and before Eren could open his mouth, he was pushed back to the room, and the glass was back in its place. Daniel gave the glass a narrow-eyed look and Eren knew it had become one-way and probably soundproof. Whoever as coming in could neither see nor hear Eren.
He leaned against the glass, pressed his face against the cool surface and sighed. So far, no one had dropped in unexpectedly and he was curious to know who it was. Every guest who'd dropped by had called beforehand. Probably a friend of Daniel's. His friend Lucian Wolfe perhaps, in which case, Eren thought excitedly, he would sense something was off and Eren would be saved.
It was two police officers, a man and a woman.
