Semua Bab Vows Written In Silence : Bab 21 - Bab 30

He doesn’t step away. If anything, he closes the space like he’s reached the end of pretending distance ever helped him think. Zoya feels it before he speaks—the way his breathing shifts, slower but heavier, like he’s holding too much inside his chest. His gaze drops, not politely, not apologetically, straight to her mouth, then back to her eyes as if he’s already made a decision and is waiting to see if she’ll stop him. “I’m sorry,” he says. His voice isn’t soft. It’s hoarse, worn down, like he hasn’t slept enough and doesn’t know how to sound careful anymore. She doesn’t respond. Her fingers tighten around the edge of her robe instead, adjusting it once, twice, a nervous reflex she doesn’t seem aware of. The fabric slips slightly at her shoulder and she stills, embarrassed, eyes dropping to the floor. “For that night,” he adds. “The masquerade.” Her jaw shifts. She keeps her gaze lowered, fixed on the open line of his shirt. Two buttons undone. The collar uneven. His Adam’s app

Mei’s voice was still in his ear when the message came in.A picture. No words. No warning. Just the preview sliding across his screen like it owned the place.Raiyan tapped it once.Masquerade lighting. Zoya mid-turn. Faiyaz’s hand at her waist—too familiar, too placed, too deliberate, his gaze fixed on her like he was claiming her. The angle did what it was meant to do. It made it look like a moment that belonged to him.That night after Elena took him away, his friends cornered him. When he had come back, he saw they had left.His heart almost stopped, the anger sharp enough that his body reacted before his mind did. It wasn’t a thought. It was a hit. His breath held for a second too long, like his chest forgot how to move.Raiyan didn’t move. He tried to suppress it. He just went still, the way he did when something shifted from irritation to threat. His fingers tightened around the phone, then loosened again, controlled and wrong, like he was keeping himself from crushing the scr

Evan didn’t have the luxury of a breakdown.The hotel suite in Oxford looked clean on purpose, the kind of clean that made your skin itch. Laptop open. Tie straight. Camera angle perfect. He looked like a man who slept properly and believed in stability. He’d slept three hours and stability was a fairy tale. He rolled his shoulders once, loosened his jaw like it was a weapon he kept holstered, then clicked into the meeting and let his face turn polite.The board grid filled the screen—four familiar names that always pretended this was partnership, never power. Daniel Whitmore with his warm lawyer smile. Clara Bennett, composed and precise. Michael Harrington who only spoke when it mattered. And Victor Hale with RMM Capital, leaning back as if he owned the air in the room.“Good evening,” Evan said, voice smooth enough to pass as calm. “Q3 rollout is clean. Expansion margins are up. Forecast unchanged. There’s nothing in the numbers that warrants drama.”Whitmore didn’t even glance at

Zoya woke up choking on the same air. The same room. The same slam in her head. Her fingers clenched the sheet so hard her nails hurt, and she still felt his grip on the neckline of her gown even though she was wearing soft lounge fabric now, even though Oxford was quiet, even though the nightmare was over. Her chest kept heaving anyway, adrenaline refusing. Not the slow kind. The violent kind that made her gasp, fingers digging into the sheets as if she’d been falling and only just caught herself. The room came back in pieces—the ceiling, the muted light, the unfamiliar quiet of Oxford—and then the memory hit, sharp and breathless. His voice. His eyes. The way his hand had closed on her gown like accusation had weight. Her chest burned. Zoya turned her head instinctively. He was there. Standing by the window. Shirtless. Damp. Like he’d stepped out of heat and didn’t bother putting himself back together. He looked unfair like this—broad shoulders, narrow waist, skin still wet

Zoya’s mouth opened.Nothing came out.Not because she didn’t have an answer — she did. It was there, sharp and ready, something she could throw at him and end the conversation cleanly. But she refused to let him see how much the question had landed. He was too close. Close enough that his shadow cut across the bed. Close enough that she could feel the heat of him before he even touched her—that restrained edge he carried when he was holding himself back from saying something irreversible.Her gaze dropped once. Traitorous.The line of his throat. The tension there like he’d been swallowing words all night and they’d turned bitter.She looked back up, properly annoyed.“Seriously?” she said, voice low, tight. “After everything, you still think—”The lights cut out.Not a flicker. Not a warning.Just gone.Darkness swallowed the room whole.The silence that followed wasn’t normal silence. It pressed. It thickened the air. Her breath stalled mid-inhale. Her fingers dug into the sheets b