This is not the end of my story. The thought is not a hope; it’s a vow. This ornate prison, this life they’ve crafted for me, is not my destiny. A fire gathers in the pit of my stomach, a low, primal burn that wants to consume everything. Escape is not enough; these gilded bars will be torn down, brick by gilded brick. This suffocating elegance will burn until the smoke chokes the sky. In the ashes, I will stand, breathing the clean, sharp air of a remade world.
I will not be consumed.
I will be the inferno.
Somewhere behind me, a candle sputters and dies. The room doesn’t notice. But I do.
Chapter 8
Darla
Thesilenceinthehouse is louder than my father’s lecture. It’s a listening silence, a pressure against my eardrums that makes the shallow, frantic rhythm of my breathing sound like a panicked gasp in the cold, still air. Up in my room, the champagne-colored silk of the dress feels like a second skin I want to peel from my bones. It’s cold against my skin, slick and lifeless, the uniform of a stranger—a ghost who answers to my name but whose soul has been hollowed out and put on display. Every beat of my heart is a frantic countdown to a future I haven’t chosen, a frantic hammer against my ribs. Wife. Transfer. Settlement. The words are a cage.
A future with Trent. Families uniting. A life sentence served in silk and polite smiles.
The thought is a spark in the tinderbox of my despair. It’s a jolt of heat in my chest, a sudden, sharp intake of breath that makes my vision clear. No. Not this. This is not my life. I won’t just burn it all down. I will be the one to light the match.
My movements are quiet, practiced, born from years of navigating my father’s moods like minefields. The dress comes off in a single, fluid motion, the zipper a low hiss in the quiet. The silk pools on the floor with a soft, defeated sigh, a shed skin from a girl I refuse to be. My hands are trembling, but not with fear. It’s a new, furious energy. I pull on the clothes that feel like my armor: worn-soft jeans ripped at the knee, the rough denim a welcome friction against my skin. A faded band tee that smells of my laundry detergent—a scent of me, not of this sterile, perfumed house. And the scuffed leather boots that have carried me through every rebellion, both seen and unseen. The solid thud of them hitting the plush carpet is a small, satisfying declaration. Each piece is a reclamation, a quiet vow whispered into the oppressive quiet of my bedroom.
My bedroom window overlooks the manicured side garden, the one my mother shows off to her charity league friends. It’s a twelve-foot drop to the perfectly mulched flowerbeds below. I don’t hesitate. My fingers find the latch, the cold metal a shock against my skin. I slide the window open, and the night air rushes in, cool and damp and smelling of damp earth and cut grass. It’s real. It’s alive.
I slip through the opening, my boots finding the familiar, worn footholds in the ivy trellis that clings to the brick. It’s a path my muscles remember from a lifetime of smaller escapes. The cool air is a welcome shock against my flushed skin, a physical jolt to a system still buzzing with trapped adrenaline. The rough texture of the brick scrapes against my palms, and a loose vinescratches my arm, the sting a grounding presence. It’s real, unlike the brittle smiles and hollow promises I just left behind. For a moment, suspended between the gilded cage and the dark ground, the air tastes of a freedom so pure and sharp it almost hurts to breathe it in.
The engine of my car turns over with a low, respectful hum, a sound I pray is too quiet to be heard. I pull out of the long, gated driveway without turning on my headlights, like a shadow slipping away into the deeper shadows of the wealthy, sleeping neighborhood. My heart is a frantic hammer against my ribs, every muscle in my back tensed, waiting. My eyes dart to the rearview mirror as I hold my breath tight in my chest, half-expecting to see the porch light flash on, to hear my father’s booming voice shatter the night.
But there’s only darkness. A silent, empty road stretching out behind me.
I’m a ghost he hasn’t yet realized is missing.
Frankie’s apartment is above her tattoo shop, Amaranth, on a street in the grittier, more honest part of town. Where the streetlights buzz with a different energy and the buildings lean into each other like old friends sharing a secret. I didn’t call. I don’t have to. Ours is a friendship built in the spaces before words are necessary.
As I reach the bottom of the rickety back stairs, the metal groaning a familiar complaint under my boots, a figure descends from the landing above. He moves with a strange, unnerving silence, his footsteps barely making a sound on the metal grate. The buzzing streetlamp at the edge of the alley casts his face in a stark, momentary glow, and my breath catches.
I know him. Arden Thorne.
He’s a family friend of Frankie’s. Arden’s a mysterious, quiet man who used to show up at her house sometimes when we were in high school. He looked older then—maybe late twenties—andalways carried an unnerving stillness that made the air in a room feel heavier.
The strange thing, the thought that makes the hairs on my arms stand up, is that he looks exactly the same now as he did all those years ago. Not a single new line on his face. Time just... missed him. The same sharp cheekbones, the same dark, watchful eyes. It feels like the air becomes thinner around him. A faint metallic scent, like storm-charged air, prickles at the back of my tongue. It’s unsettling.
He gives me a single, unreadable nod as he passes, his gaze so intense it feels like he’s seeing straight through me, cataloging every secret I’m trying to hide. Then he’s gone, a shadow swallowed by the darkness of the alley.
Shaking off the strange encounter, I take the stairs two at a time. Her door is unlocked. It always is for me.
The loft is a chaotic sanctuary. It smells of sage, turpentine, and the sharp, clean scent of green soap she uses for her ink. Unfinished canvases lean against walls covered in charcoal sketches and flash designs. Music plays from a vintage record player in the corner—something low and smoky with a female vocalist whose voice sounds like heartbreak and whiskey.
Frankie is curled on a worn velvet armchair, a sketchbook open in her lap, her dark hair falling across her face. She looks up when I step inside, and her eyes, sharp and knowing, take in my ripped jeans, the lingering tension in my shoulders, and the ghost of my father’s house I’ve dragged in with me.
My voice is a little breathless, the image of the man in the alley still fresh in my mind. "I just saw Arden Thorne leaving."
Frankie lets out a long, weary sigh and rolls her eyes, a look of pure, long-suffering familiarity. "Yeah, he's looking for my sister," she says, her tone dismissive. "But then again, who isn't?" The comment is so casual, so full of a drama I'm not privyto, that it almost makes the unsettling encounter feel normal. Almost.
She closes her sketchbook, her focus returning entirely to me. She unfolds herself from the chair and says, “You look like hell. Tea or tequila?”
“Both,” I manage, my voice rough.
A real smile, small and sure, touches her lips. “Attagirl.”
As she moves to the kitchenette, I sink onto her ridiculously comfortable couch. The cushions sigh as they take my weight. For the first time all night, the tightness in my chest eases, the muscles in my shoulders unknotting one by one. My father's house offered security, but Frankie's offered sanctuary. I can breathe here.
