The collar of light didn’t fade when Liora woke the next morning. She’d hoped it was some fever dream, that the strange building and its otherworldly owner were just fragments of her tired mind. But when she looked in the mirror, a faint shimmer wrapped her throat like a chain of stars. It pulsed softly with every heartbeat, warm against her skin. She touched it, and the warmth deepened, as if the collar recognized her fingers. She gasped and stumbled back, nearly knocking over the sink.
Her phone lay silent on the counter. No missed calls. No messages. The world outside this tower might as well have disappeared. She had no idea how she got from his office to the soft bed she’d woken up in, no memory of leaving. The room she was in didn’t look like a hotel. The walls curved gently, glowin
