All Chapters of Silenced By The Billionaire : Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

POV: ElaraI am not supposed to be here, this looks like the wrong floor. The realization hits me the second the elevator doors glide open with a hushed whisper. The air shifts immediately thicker, colder, carrying the faint scent of aged wood, leather, and something metallic I can’t quite name.My pulse kicks up. I press the elevator button again, harder this time, but the panel stays dark. The doors have already sealed behind me with a soft, final click, trapping me in this unfamiliar hallway like a verdict.“Great,” I mutter under my breath, gripping my small clutch tightly. The sequins from my own design dig into my palm. I only wanted five minutes. Five minutes away from the pounding bass, the sweaty bodies rubbing against each other. As a 21 year old aspiring fashion designer still fighting for every break, I had jumped at the chance when my friend got me on the guest list for this high-end event on the upper floors of one of the city’s most elite skyscrapers.I told my friend

POV: Elara Seven o’clock doesn’t arrive with a chime. It arrives with the sound of a deadbolt sliding open, a cold, mechanical reminder that my autonomy has been replaced by a schedule. Adriana, Dante’s household manager, stands in the doorway. She is the human personification of this penthouse: expensive, sharp, and entirely impenetrable. Dressed in a charcoal suit that looks like armor, she doesn’t use words when a cold stare will do. She was the one who received me when the guards dumped me here in the middle of the night, and she is the one who monitors my every breath now. “Mr. Moretti is expecting you in the dining hall,” Adriana says. Her voice is as thin and sharp as a razor blade. I’ve spent the last few hours doing more than just pacing. I’ve been mapping. I noted the frequency of the guards' rotations in the hallway, every fifteen minutes and the fact that the floor-to-ceiling windows are reinforced acrylic, not glass. You can’t break out of them, even if you had a chair

POV: DanteI knew the second the air in the room changed. One moment, I was navigating Isabella Cruz’s thinly veiled insults; the next thing I felt the back of my neck prickled with a warning I’d learned to trust in the trenches of the underworld. I scanned the room. Luca was gone. Marco was looking toward the east hallway with a focused, lethal intensity. And Elara was nowhere to be seen.“Where is she?” I asked, my voice a low vibration that made the socialite next to me flinch.“She went to the powder room, boss,” Marco muttered, stepping into my shadow. “I lost eyes for five seconds. There was a distraction.”I didn't wait for him to finish. I moved through the crowded ballroom like a blade through silk. Every instinct I possessed was screaming. I didn’t care about the optics anymore. I didn’t care if the feds watching the house saw the mask slip. When I reached the east wing, the silence was too heavy. I found the study door ajar. Inside, the air smelled of ozone and the faint,

POV: Elara My body ached in ways I didn’t want to think about. I lay curled up in the massive bed, staring at the dark city skyline through the floor-to-ceiling windows. The silk sheets felt too soft against my skin, a cruel contrast to the bruises on my wrists and the stinging cut on my neck. Every time I moved, memories flooded back, Dante’s rough hands gripping my thighs, his teeth on my neck, the violent way we had torn into each other like we were trying to destroy one another and heal at the same time. Hate sex. That was what it was. Nothing more. Yet my body still hummed with the memory, traitorous and aching, and shame burned hot in my chest. How could I hate him so fiercely and still crave his touch? How could I let myself fall apart under the hands of the man who had ruined my life? A soft knock pulled me from my spiraling thoughts. “Miss Vance?” A calm, professional voice came through the door. “It’s Dr. Adrian Hale. May I come in?” I sat up slowly, wincing at the s

POV: Elara Sunlight filtered through the floor-to-ceiling windows of the penthouse, casting long golden beams across the dark marble floors. The city stretched endlessly below me, alive with movement, freedom, noise, everything that felt impossibly far away now. I stood barefoot in the middle of the living room wrapped in a soft black silk robe that wasn’t mine, staring down at the streets far beneath the glass. Tiny cars moved like ants. People walked sidewalks without fear, without guards shadowing their every move, without a man like Dante Moretti deciding where they could go and who they could speak to. The view was beautiful. But no matter how luxurious the penthouse was, no matter how expensive the furniture or how breathtaking the skyline looked at sunrise, it was still a cage. A beautiful one. My body ached as I shifted my weight. Not just from Luca’s ropes or the shallow cut still healing at my neck. From Dante. From the bruising intensity of last night. He