Chapter 88: Separate Wings

Nathaniel did not guide Lillian through the house the way a husband might. There was no hand at her back, no reassuring gesture, no attempt to frame the moment as intimacy. He walked half a step ahead, his pace even, precise, as though this were an inspection rather than the beginning of shared domestic life.

Celestine Heights was quiet in the early afternoon. Not the organic quiet of absence, but the engineered silence of wealth. Thick walls. Concealed corridors for staff. Sound absorbed befor