Shattering the Silence

Ariana’s POV

“Stay down,” Luca whispered, his body already shielding mine. His hand gripped my arm tight enough to feel bruise, not really though, but he pulled me beneath the edge of the couch.

“What was that?” I gasped.

He didn’t answer. His eyes scanned the broken window across the room, glass glittering like stars on the hardwood floor. A cold breeze sliced through the space, then silence followed, but not the safe kind. It was the charged, listening kind. I held my breath. Then Luca moved fast to check the window. His muscles tensed. “Nothing,” he muttered. “No one out there. But that wasn’t just a random thing.”

I sat up slowly. “You think they found us?”

He met my eyes. “They didn’t need to. This was a warning.”

A warning. I pulled the blanket tighter around myself. My skin was still warm from his touch minutes ago, and slowly it burned with cold dread. “Then they know I’m not dead.”

“Vanessa doesn’t bluff,” he said, pacing toward the fireplace. “If she sends someone to rattle the cage, it means she’s not buying the setup. Which means we need to make her believe it.”

“How?” I asked, standing shakily. “We have staged everything,, the photos, our disappearance.”

“We didn’t leak it wide enough,” he said. “She’s not afraid yet.”

I moved to the window, the cold air biting my skin beyond the broken glass, the woods were still — no movements, just the silence… it howled.

“You think she sent Nathan?”

Luca shook his head. “No. Vanessa wouldn’t risk him yet. She’s saving him for the kill shot.” I flinched at the phrase. “Then who?”

He shrugged. “She may be sending one of her shadows. People like her don’t work alone. They move with people they pay to ensure they keep the silence, no trails.”

I swallowed hard. “Then we have to disappear for real this time.”

He turned to me, jaw tight. “Ari… if we do that, there’s no coming back, no work, no friends, no life in New York. Are you sure you’re ready for that?”

I stared at him. At the man who once vanished to protect me. At the man I almost walked away from twice.

“I’m ready to burn it all,” I whispered. “Because they already tried to erase me once. This time… I erase them.”

*******

The next morning was quiet in a way funerals are quiet. We didn’t talk much. We packed light. I left behind everything I didn’t need—including the version of me that once flinched at confrontation.

Luca loaded the car with two bags and a burner phone he’d activated under a fake name. We didn’t take the highway. We took the back roads, dirt lanes, and forgotten paths that went through the woods like veins. By noon, we crossed into a small upstate town I barely recognized. The motel he picked was rundown and quiet — just three rooms and a neon sign that buzzed like a dying fly. Perfect for ghosts house. Room six smelled like cedar and was chill. The mattress creaked under me when I sat, exhausted. “How long do we stay here?”

“As long as it takes,” Luca said, checking the windows.

My fingers ran across the edge of the pillow. “You think she’ll find us or should I say retaliate?”

“She already did. The shattered window was suspicious to me. I am thinking she’ll try to isolate you.”

“She’s underestimating me,” I said softly. “They all do.”

He smiled faintly. “They won’t for long.”

By nightfall, we had a plan. Not just to vanish — but to fight back.

“I still have a name,” I said, pacing. “A brand. I want to use that. Let’s leak a story. A controlled scandal. Let Vanessa believe I’m off the rails, emotionally spiraling, that I’ve gone cold.”

“Risky,” Luca said. “But if it forces her to act, we should give it a try then. And what next are you thinking?”

“Then we follow her,” I finished. “And end this.”

He stepped toward me, something unreadable in his eyes. “You’re not the same woman I used to know.”

“Good,” I said. “She was too afraid to fight.”

He cupped my face. “And now?”

I leaned into his touch. “Now I’m too angry not to.”

The next day, the headlines dropped.

“Luxury Director Vanishes After Affair Scandal — Sources Claim Emotional Breakdown Behind Sudden Disappearance.”

Anonymous comments, blurry photos with no confirmation but just enough bait. And Vanessa took it.

By dusk, Luca intercepted a call between Vanessa and someone listed only as “Sparrow.” It was coded, but we recognized the keywords they used. 

“She’s off balance,” Vanessa said. “Proceed as planned. Leak the footage. Let her fall on her own sword.”

Luca looked up from the transcript. “They’re releasing the video.”

My blood froze. “The one from the hotel?”

He nodded. “Her goal isn’t to destroy you legally. She wants you broken and humiliated.”

I sat down slowly. “Then let her try.”

“But Ariana, once it’s out, there’s no taking it back.”

I looked him dead in the eye. “Let her leak it. And while the world watches me burn… we are going to watch her bleed. I will make sure of that.”

********

Three days later, the video dropped.

Every screen, every feed and every social media account that ever had my name. A two-minute grainy video of me and Luca, half-naked and Kissing. A bedroom I didn’t recognize — but a body they did.

//“Leaked: Ariana Cole’s secret affair exposed.”//

The internet did what it does best. It devoured me. Tweets. Articles. Reels even Clickbait.

“Wife of Neurosurgeon caught cheating on camera.”

“Luxury strategist or sex addict?”

Daniel Cole refuses to comment. I felt as the shame tried to choke me — but I didn’t flinch. I stared at it. I let it play but I didn’t apologize, because I finally understood something.

I didn’t owe anyone my silence.

Later that night, I sat on the motel floor, knees tucked to my chest. Luca watched me from the edge of the bed. “Say the word,” he said, “and we disappear for good.”

I looked at him. “No. Not yet. Not until she’s finished.”

He nodded.

I looked down at my hand.

The wedding ring was gone.

But the fire in my chest? It had never burned brighter.

********

Across town, in a high-rise glass building, Vanessa stared at a screen and smiled.

“She’s ruined,” she said, but she was wrong. I wasn’t ruined. I was just getting started with my own plans.