THE MAID HE CAN'T FORGET

"SOME PEOPLE LEAVE MARKS YOU CAN SEE. OTHERS LEAVE THE KIND THAT SIT QUIETLY INSIDE YOUR CHEST AND REFUSE TO HEAL." 

STELLA

My body ached before I even opened my eyes. Every muscle protested as I shifted under the heavy silk sheets. The soreness between my legs was deep and constant, a reminder of how roughly Derek had taken me. The room was still dark, the storm reduced to a dull patter against the windows. Dawn hadn’t arrived yet. Good. I needed to be gone before he woke up properly.

I slid out of the bed slowly, biting back a whimper when my bruised hips brushed the edge of the mattress. My legs felt unsteady. I found the silk robe on the floor and pulled it on with shaking hands, tying it tight. Every movement made me aware of the marks he’d left—fingerprints on my thighs, a bite on my neck, the raw ache inside.

I took one step toward the door.

An arm snaked around my waist and yanked me back.

He didn't open his eyes. He was still more asleep than awake, I could tell by the looseness of his grip, the way his breathing hadn't changed. But his hand held on with the unconscious certainty of someone who had decided something and hadn't bothered to inform his brain about it yet. A long moment passed.

"Tonight too," he muttered. Then his hand loosened and he turned onto his side and the slow breathing resumed like nothing had happened at all. I stood there in the dark beside his bed for three full seconds, heart hammering, before I gathered the silk from the floor and walked to the door on silent feet and let myself out.

Lady Valentina was in the corridor.

Of course she was. Dressed already, composed already, not a strand of gold hair out of place despite the hour. She looked at me the way a woman looks at an invoice she is checking for errors — quick, methodical, thorough. Her eyes moved across my throat, my wrists, the careful way I was holding myself.

"Did he say anything?" she asked.

"No."

Her gaze snagged on the bruising along my collarbone. Something moved across her expression and I braced for it — sympathy, guilt, some acknowledgment that what she had arranged was not a small thing to ask of another person.

Instead her shoulders dropped slightly. The tension she had been carrying since I walked out that door released itself in one quiet exhale. She looked, unmistakably, relieved. Not for me. For herself. The relief of a woman who had just confirmed that someone else had absorbed something she had been dreading.

She reached into her pocket without a word and held out a small glass vial. A pregnancy medicine. Clear liquid, faintly bitter smelling even from a distance.

I took it.

She smoothed the front of her dress and walked back toward her chambers. No thank you. No acknowledgment of what the night had cost. Just the soft sound of her door closing behind her and the empty corridor and the vial cold in my palm.

I stood there for a moment in the dim hallway and swallowed it alone.

To Alpha Derek, I was just Valentina acting differently in the dark—more responsive, wetter, louder. A better toy. The thought made my chest tight with shame and exhaustion as I slipped away to the servants’ quarters.

The day dragged like a punishment. I moved through my usual duties with gritted teeth. Cleaning, carrying trays, keeping my head down. Every step reminded me of him. The deep ache, the way my thighs rubbed together. I flinched when I bent to pick up broken glass in the east wing, a sharp pain shooting through my core.

By afternoon, I heard the whispers from the other maids.

“Alpha Derek seems… off today.”

“He keeps watching Lady Valentina like he’s waiting for something.”

I kept my face blank, scrubbing the floor harder. Of course he was irritated. The real Valentina had been her usual cold, distant self all day—polite smiles, perfect posture, zero fire. Nothing like the woman who had moaned and clenched shamefully around him last night. He wanted that version again. And he had no idea she only existed when I took her place.

Night fell too quickly.

I was wiping down a marble console table near the grand staircase when the atmosphere in the palace changed. Servants froze mid-step. Voices dropped to fearful murmurs.

“He’s back.”

“Alpha Damien returned an hour ago.”

The name alone sucked the warmth from the air. I kept working, but my hands trembled. Everyone lowered their heads as heavy footsteps echoed through the entrance hall. Even the guards seemed smaller. I shouldn’t have looked.

But I did. 

Alpha Damien stood in the center of the hall, tall and unnaturally still. His dark coat clung to broad shoulders, rain dripping from it onto the polished floor. Power rolled off him in heavy waves—cold, oppressive, like the moment before lightning struck. Not the burning heat of Derek’s presence. This was something darker. Something that felt like violence wrapped in perfect control.

He started walking forward. Everyone bowed deeper. My stupid, exhausted body didn’t move fast enough. For one second, my gaze lifted and met his. His steps faltered.

Those eyes—dark, piercing—locked onto mine. The air thickened. Something shifted in his expression, a tiny crack in that icy mask. I dropped my head immediately, heart hammering against my ribs. My fingers gripped the cleaning cloth until my knuckles hurt. Alpha Damien stood frozen for another heartbeat. Then he continued walking, but the tension in the hall had doubled. I felt his eyes on me even as he moved past, burning into the back of my neck.

I didn’t dare look up again.

But I knew, deep in my bones, that with Alpha Damien returning to the Nightwing pack he must have returned because of something very important and it was either good or bad–very–very bad.