Masuk“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
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
“What does that have to do with any of this?” I asked Matteo, suppressing my impatience as I twirled restlessly on my chair. My fingers found the smooth rim of the armrest and pressed until the leather complained. Waiting is not a talent i possess. It shows in small betrayals—how i move, in the til
~~RAFAELE~~ A dive into Aurelia’s head always feels like going lost in a tunnel that has other tunnels and if you don’t know what you’re looking for exactly, you’ll end up getting drawn by the wrong tunnel and get devoured by its contents. It is a claustrophobic sort of curiosity, the kind that ma
~~AURELIA~~ “To be his was madness. To be theirs was annihilation. Yet when they touched me, I understood what eternity meant. How pleasure could be a cage, and devotion a curse.” —Anonymous His mouth is hot and cold at the same time. It’s a shock to my flesh and he shudders slightly. He feel







