Chapter 6: Tangled Lies

The house was too quiet after Cassandra had left. Too still, as though the walls were holding their breath, waiting to breathe. Isabella sat on the edge of their bed, her mind replaying every sneaky glance, every snake-tipped remark between Alexander and that woman.

She yearned to believe him. She yearned to believe that his past did not linger in their present. But the look that had flashed on his face when he first saw Cassandra… it tormented her.

Later, after Alexander returned from the study, his face was chiseled in granite.

"Isabella," he broke in quietly, "whatever you think you overheard"

"I didn't think, Alexander. I heard," she cut in, her voice quivering over her attempts at audacity. "You said she smashed something. What was it?"

His teeth gritted. "It doesn't matter any longer."

"It matters to me," Isabella pressed, her voice cracking. "Because whether you like it or not, she remains. Between us."

For a moment, his mask slipped and she saw the storm under it. Pain. Anger. Regret. But then it was gone, behind cool detachment once more.

"Let go, Isabella," he growled, turning away.

Isabella couldn't, though.

The next morning, while Alexander was at a board meeting, she found herself wandering into his study. The room was ever so faintly scented with cedar and whiskey, weighted down with unspoken things.

She ran her fingers along the spines of the books, the heavy oak table, until she reached a locked drawer. Her heart was racing. Something within her was warning her not to. But another voice, a louder one, was insisting that she continue.

Her fingers trembled as she tried the tiniest brass key that she could locate in the desk tray. It clicked.

Papers. Old letters. A photograph.

Isabella's breathing ceased.

It was Alexander, years younger, by Cassandra's side. His arm draped across her waist. The smile on his face was not the cold, guarded one she now knew. It was genuine. Open. Vulnerable.

Her stomach roiled as she grasped one of the letters.

"Alexander, I never meant for it to happen like this. You need to realize I had no choice…"

The words blended together as she filled her eyes with tears. No choice? What was Cassandra guilty of? What could have possibly gone so terribly wrong for Alexander to be left broken enough to marry for vengeance?

That evening, Alexander found her sitting in the study, the portrait trembling in her hand.

"Isabella," his voice was gruff, threatening. "What have you done?"

Her head snapped up, tears streaming down her face. "You loved her. Didn't you?"

His silence was the cruelest answer of all.

The photograph trembled in Isabella’s hands. The silence between them was unbearable thick, suffocating, like a storm pressing against glass.

“You loved her,” Isabella whispered again, her voice breaking. “And all this time, you’ve been punishing me for her sins, haven’t you?”

Alexander’s jaw clenched. He stepped forward, plucked the photo from her fingers, and shoved it back into the drawer before slamming it shut.

Stop digging where you don't belong," he snapped, his voice shaking with some feeling she couldn't determine.

"Don't belong?" she cried, standing. "I'm your wife! How can I not belong in your past, in your pain? You can't shut me out, Alexander. Not when it's destroying us.

He turned away, his shoulders stiff. For the first time, she saw his strength as a prison, every muscle wound tight around secrets he couldn't let go.

Finally, his voice came, low and rough.

"She destroyed everything."

Isabella's heart raced. "What did she do?"

Alexander's fists closed on the edge of the desk, his knuckles white. He didn't turn to her when he spoke.

"She wasn't just someone I loved. She was someone I trusted with everything. My business. My future. My—" His voice cracked. "My heart. And she destroyed it all. She betrayed me in ways you can't even start to imagine."

The room temperature dropped by ten degrees. Isabella's heart ached. "So this marriage…"

"Yes," he spat, finally turning to face her, his eyes burning with a mix of anger and pain. "This marriage began as revenge. Against her. Against all the lies she told me. You were never supposed to mean anything, Isabella. You were supposed to be… convenient."

The words sliced through her. She flinched as if she'd been slapped.

"But you do now," he added, his voice breaking. "More than I ever wanted you to. And that terrifies me to death."

Isabella's tears streamed down her face. "You cannot love me and tie me to the spirit of her at the same time, Alexander. You have to choose."

His throat tightened, yet no sound was forthcoming. He was a man rent in two half buried in vengeance, half perishing for the woman in front of him.

And in that silence, Isabella knew: whatever it was he had yet to tell her was darker than betrayal. It was the thing that would never allow him to move forward.