Chapter 2

Chapter 2: The House of Silence

---

The estate was too quiet without Ethan.

Even the air felt heavier, as though the house held its breath the moment his car left the grounds. I stood behind the drawing-room curtains, watching the black Mercedes disappear into the tree-lined drive, the shadows of dusk stretching long and thin behind it. A chill crawled across my bare shoulders despite the summer heat.

Ethan hadn’t even kissed me goodbye. Just a polite nod and a distracted “I’ll call.”

As if I were his assistant, not his wife.

I remained by the window long after he was gone, the silence pressing in around me like velvet walls. Soft, suffocating.

The house was a maze of too many rooms. Rooms with locked doors. Rooms no one entered. Rooms filled with relics of a family legacy I had married into but didn’t understand. Sometimes, I wondered if anyone really lived here—or if the mansion was merely a monument to cold ambition.

I wandered the hallways, my robe whispering against the marble floors. I wasn’t looking for anything.

And yet…

I ended up in the east wing.

A place Ethan had told me not to enter. “That part of the house is his,” he’d once said, meaning Christopher. His stepfather. The man who owned everything and answered to no one.

The air in the east wing was different. Colder. Older. The walls were lined with dark wooden panels and portraits of unsmiling ancestors. There were no flowers here. No warmth. Just the quiet creak of old bones in the floorboards and the ghosts of a family that ate itself alive.

Then—his voice.

“You shouldn’t be here.”

I turned slowly. He stood at the far end of the corridor, framed by shadows and low golden light. Christopher D’Amelio. Power in human form. He looked like he was born from everything rich men bury—violence, pain, restraint.

His shirt was half unbuttoned, the sleeves rolled up. A drink in one hand. Barefoot. Casual, yet commanding. Like a king in his ruined palace.

“I didn’t mean to trespass,” I said, even though I had.

He tilted his head. “Didn’t you?”

A long pause stretched between us. He didn’t move. Just studied me.

“You’re different when Ethan isn’t here,” I said before I could stop myself.

He chuckled. “So are you.”

I flushed. “That’s not what I meant.”

“No?” He took a slow sip from his glass, then stepped toward me. “Then tell me what you meant, little bride.”

I hated how his voice made my skin prickle. How my body betrayed me with heat under his stare. He had the kind of presence that pulled you into orbit and left you breathless in the dark.

“I’m married to your son,” I whispered, backing against the wall.

“Step-son,” he corrected, standing too close. “Ethan is not my blood. We were never family. Don’t confuse obligation with affection.”

“Still. He’s my husband.”

“And yet here you are,” he murmured, brushing his fingers lightly over my wrist. “Wandering into the one part of the house he warned you to avoid. Did you want to see what you’d find?”

I swallowed hard. “I think you like playing these games.”

He leaned in, his breath warm against my temple. “You think this is a game?”

A pause. Silence. Then—

“I saw you watching me at the party,” he said. “Three nights ago. When Ethan disappeared upstairs and left you stranded with those snakes. You were looking for someone to see you.”

I turned my face away. “That’s not true.”

“You looked beautiful that night. And sad. Like a bird in a golden cage.”

His hand drifted higher, just barely brushing the curve of my shoulder. His touch was so subtle, it might’ve been imagined.

“Stop,” I breathed.

He did.

But he didn’t move away.

“I won’t touch you unless you want me to,” he said softly. “But be careful, Ivana. Curiosity can be dangerous in this house. Especially when it comes to me.”

Then he walked past me. Slow. Unbothered. A whisper of expensive cologne in the air.

I stood there long after he was gone.

My body ached with shame. With questions. With something darker.

Something like desire.

---

Later That Night

I sat on the edge of our marital bed, staring at the mirror. My reflection didn’t look like me anymore.

My robe was slightly parted, lips swollen from biting down my thoughts. My skin still tingled where he’d touched me. And in my eyes… I saw something Ethan had never seen.

Hunger.

I climbed into bed, alone. The sheets cold. My heart colder.

And still, when I finally drifted to sleep, it was his voice that came to me.

Not Ethan’s.

His.

Christopher’s.