Chapter 5

Elena’s POV

Over the next few days, Adrian acted as if nothing had happened.

He returned to the estate.

He started showing up for meals on time.

An outsider would probably assume we had made up.

The master of the Blackwood household had finally come home.

His human wife had finally stopped making trouble.

At dinner, he would sit at the other end of the long table and occasionally ask, “How much did you eat today?”

His tone could even pass for gentle.

But every time I looked up at him, all I felt was a stranger staring back.

I realized that after losing the baby, I had also lost the illusion. I could no longer find even a trace of love in his cold expression and his rigid, distant manner.

He was just checking to see if I had gone back to being a wife who ate her meals quietly, stayed put, and wouldn’t bother him with divorce talk again.

The porridge the servants brought was still cold.

The soup still had that nauseating, fishy taste.

But the dessert appeared every single day.

Sometimes on a different plate.

Sometimes with different decoration.

But the taste was always the same.

Cloyingly sweet.

So sweet it reminded me of our first date, when Adrian pushed it across the table, his eyes carrying a glint of novelty.

He said, “As far as human food goes, this one’s actually interesting.”

Looking at him then, I had thought it endearing that even a lofty vampire could be clumsy about sharing something he liked.

So I ate it.

Smiled and said it was delicious.

I hadn’t known then that one careless compliment would trap me for three years.

Now, everyone in the estate believed this dessert was my favorite.

Only I knew that every time I forced it down, it was because this one dish that the master of the house happened to like was the only thing on the table I could stomach.

That evening at dinner, I managed half a sip of the porridge.

My stomach heaved instantly.

I set down the spoon.

Adrian looked up, leisurely sipping blood from his wine glass.

“Not eating again?”

I said nothing.

He watched me for a long time, his expression slowly turning colder.

“Elena, how much longer are you going to keep this up?”

I lifted my head.

“I can’t eat.”

“You didn’t used to be like this.”

“Used to?”

I looked at him, suddenly finding those words absurd.

I used to force down that dessert, used to pick through the cold porridge for a few bites I could swallow.

I used to suppress every discomfort just so he’d still look at me with some tenderness when he came home, enough to carry me through these endless nights.

But none of that was because I liked it, and it certainly had nothing to do with being a dutiful wife.

I had simply been enduring.

“I don’t like the dessert.”

I turned to look at Adrian.

Adrian frowned.

“You ate it every single time.”

I smiled flatly. “Because it was your favorite.”

He went silent for a moment.

I saw a flicker of hesitation in his eyes.

But the hesitation was quickly swallowed by impatience.

“Now you want to fight about this too?”

I set down my napkin.

“I’m not fighting.”

“I’m just telling you I don’t like the dessert.”

He didn’t respond.

The dining room was suffocatingly quiet.

After a long pause, Adrian said, “Then what do you like?”

I looked at him.

In that moment, I couldn’t answer.

Three years of marriage, and he had finally asked me what I liked.

But it came at the very moment I no longer wanted to answer.

I stood and left the dining room.

Behind me, Celeste murmured, “Mrs. Blackwood really has changed a lot lately.”

“She never used to embarrass you like this.”

Adrian said nothing.

I didn’t know what expression was on his face.

And I didn’t want to glance back.

I went back upstairs and passed the locked door at the end of the hallway.

That was the studio Adrian had promised me.

The first year, he said the light in the vampire castle wasn’t right for human painting, and the windows needed to be redone.

The second year, he said the materials in the estate were harmful to a human body and would interfere with my chances of conceiving, so everything had to be re-screened.

The third year, he said I should focus on settling into my role as Mrs. Blackwood first, and the studio could wait.

Every single time, he said he was working on it.

Every single time, I believed him, even blaming myself sometimes for being too much trouble.

I stopped in front of the door and reached out to push it.

Locked.

No light inside.

I pressed my face to the crack and smelled nothing but dust and old wood.

This was the studio he had promised me.

A room that was always locked.

A lie that could always be held over me to keep me in line.

I went back to my room and opened my sketchbook.

Only a few old drawings remained.

All from before the wedding.

The edges of the paper had yellowed.

But the charcoal lines were still sharp.

I traced the outline of that damaged sculpture with my fingertip.

It was what I’d been drawing the first time Adrian saw me.

He had stood at the gallery entrance and watched for a long time.

He said my lines seemed to have a soul.

That line once made me believe he truly saw me.

Now I realized he had probably just fallen in love with the quiet human girl sitting by the window, pretty and focused and incapable of defiance.

Late that night, Adrian came to my room.

He didn’t knock.

In his view, I was his wife.

My room, my body, my time, all belonged to him.

He walked up behind me and saw the sketchbook in my hands.

“Looking at those again?”

I closed the book.

“These are my drawings.”

“I know.”

His tone was flat.

“When you’re feeling better, I’ll have someone get the studio ready.”

I looked at him.

“When?”

He paused for a moment.

“Soon.”

Soon. Again.

I had been hearing that for three years.

I said, “Adrian, you don’t actually care.”

His brow furrowed.

“If I didn’t care, would I have promised to build you a studio?”

His expression darkened.

“Do you really have to fight me over something this small?”

Small.

My art.

My work. The talent I had once made a living from.

My letters, my taste in food, even my reasons for wanting a divorce.

In his eyes, none of it seemed to matter.

The only thing that mattered was whether I was obedient, whether I listened to him, whether I submitted.

He stepped closer and reached for my shoulder.

I flinched away instinctively.

His hand stopped in midair.

The temperature in the room seemed to drop all at once.

“Elena.”

His voice dropped low.

“Now you won’t even let me touch you?”

I didn’t look at him.

“I’m tired.”

“You never used to turn me away.”

I let out a quiet laugh.

Again with “used to.”

I used to think submission meant being loved.

That when he came to me, it was because he genuinely wanted me.

Now I finally understood. What he liked was only my obedience.

He liked me with my head bowed, obedient.

Liked me afraid.

Liked having me depend on him entirely in his world.

I said, “Now I do.”

Adrian’s breath hitched for an instant.

He stared at me for a long time, then coldly withdrew his hand.

“When you’ve sorted out your head, we’ll talk.”

The door closed again.

I sat on the edge of the bed and suddenly felt nothing at all.

He had left again.

Just like every time before.

As long as I refused to give in, he would walk away.

He assumed his silence and coldness would push me back to where I’d been.

But this time, I didn’t cry.

The next day, Adrian skipped breakfast.

He went to the Elder Council, but he had also learned that I’d barely eaten or drunk anything for the past two days.

Celeste brought me a new gown, saying Adrian wanted me to put it on and join him for dinner that evening.

The gown was beautiful.

Silver-white, studded with tiny diamonds.

Like a gilded cage.

I didn’t wear it.

I put on my old dress instead, the one I’d brought with me before the wedding.

The hem wasn’t grand enough.

But it was mine.

On the fifth evening, Adrian finally came back.

The moment he saw me, his brow furrowed.

“Why aren’t you wearing the gown I gave you?”

I placed the divorce agreement on the dinner table again.

“Because I’m not your decoration.”

His expression hardened.

I looked him in the eye and said, word by word, “Adrian.”

“This time, you have to sign.”