LOGIN“You are an interesting woman,” he says finally, as though he has been collecting sentiments about me like curiosities. “I am not for your amusement,” I say. “Amusement is a generous way of putting it.” He turns his face to me and finally, which is nothing like mercy, he kisses me. It is a small t
“You will come with me tonight,” he says suddenly, and when I look at him the certainty in his eyes is a rope. “Where are we going?” I ask. I do not like the sound of my own voice in the dark halls. “To the club,” he says, as if the clubs he owns are nothing more than rooms he has arranged for his
The dinner goes on without ceremony. I wear a dress that fits like a promise and is less comfortable than anything else I own. The woman who dresses me fusses at the strap and at the hem with an intimacy that is practiced, like a ritual done daily for decades. The room where dinner is served is a pl
“You should not have broken a tray,” he says in that voice that is silk wrapped around steel. It makes everyone quiet because it is a voice that is treated like currency in this house. The words are simple but the way he says them says a thousand more complicated things. He is not angry the way I am
I come back from the memory to find sunlight in my eyes and orange juice dried on the carpet like the outline of a wound. My hands are trembling now for reasons I cannot name. The house clock in the hall ticks the way a heart does when it is being measured. There are noises behind the walls, small h
Oh God, I hate him. He is the center of everything I cannot control in this place. He is the reason doors close and keys rattle and the nights feel like traps. He is the reason my throat tastes like metal at dusk. He is also the reason, absurdly and against my every better judgment, that sometimes
“We make an example,” i said finally. “But not for show. For message. We break the line so no one else thinks they can stitch themselves to us and pull strings.” The words were cold and final. I wanted the city to remember that the cost of trespass was not subtle. Matteo’s eyes met mine and i read
~~RAFAELE~~ I rose then, not because i wanted to leave the study but because the act of standing uncoiled a plan inside me. The chair gave a soft sigh as weight lifted from it. My hand grazed the desk and felt the warmth of the lamp’s bulb through the paper. I could smell Matteo’s cologne, the ster
Frank. The simplicity of the name made my teeth grind. Names that sound ordinary are the ones you watch the closest. Perhaps because they are the least likely to warn you of danger. “And this frank, is linked to the mad vampire when he doesn’t associate with vampires? Make me understand something.”
I let my finger trace the margin as if the letters would slip off the page and into my skin. Names anchor people. The mention of Texas felt too far, like someone had dropped a cold stone into local waters. My mind kept mapping distances. How did a name like that find its way here? Matteo makes a so







