And I had sent her here.
Nine months.
Nine endless, suffocating months since I’d made the gravest mistake of my life.
I’d condemned my wife—Elena—to this abyss.
The woman I’d vowed before God and witnesses to protect, even if our marriage had been forged in vengeance and strategy rather than love.
I had taken an oath knowing full well my intentions were poisoned from the start, and still... an oath was an oath.
I had broken it.
I pulled my coat tighter against the wind, but the cold that seeped into my bones had nothing to do with the weather. It came from inside. A familiar ache—one I knew too well.
I had framed her.
Pinned the murder of Maria—my late pregnant wife—on Elena with surgical precision. Fabricated evidence. Coerced testimony. Strategic leaks.
I’d used my influence like a scalpel, cutting truth away until only the narrative I wanted remained.
All because her sister was the real killer.
And Elena was expendable.
At the time, it had felt righteous. Necessary. The grief had been a wildfire in my chest, devouring reason, choking mercy.
Every breath I took after Maria’s death had tasted of ash. Revenge wasn’t just desire—it was survival. Without it, I would have imploded.
So I chose the nearest target.
The easiest one.
The one who shared blood with the woman who had destroyed my world.
And I told myself it was justice.
But standing here now, staring at the fortress that held her captive, the weight of that decision pressed down on me like the prison walls themselves—unyielding, merciless.
I remembered the second day of our fractured marriage with brutal clarity.
She had knelt before me.
Not figuratively.
Actually knelt.
Tears streaked her face, shoulders trembling, pride abandoned in a way that still unsettled me when I allowed myself to think about it.
She hadn’t begged for mercy. She hadn’t pleaded for her freedom.
She had confessed something far more dangerous.
“I don’t know if it’s love,” she’d said, voice shaking but unflinchingly sincere, “but I feel something for you. My heart leaps when I see you.”
I’d laughed.
A sharp, ugly sound.
