I wonder if they’re just waiting for me to rot inside this cage alone.
But more than anything, I wonder if Theo is looking for me.His face is still the one I can’t shake. The one thought that pushes its way through the fog when I start to forget what the hell I’m fighting for.
I’m not sure which version of me he’d find if he walked through that door now—the girl with secrets and sass, or the one who’s started whispering to herself just to feel a vibration in the air.
I hate what this place is doing to me.
So I start talking again. Aloud. To the ceiling. To the walls. I narrate my mornings like I’m on a cooking show. I critique the tray’s presentation like a judge in a baking competition. I mock the floral arrangements for being more passive aggressive than the men in this house.
I dare the cameras—if there are any—to show my father how little he’s actually accomplished.
They think they’re wearing me down, but I’ve lived too long under the thumb of Lachlan Kavanagh to be surprised by this kind of warfare.
Silence is just another kind of weapon. And I’ve been through enough to know how to survive it. So I wait. I whisper my plans when the lights are off. I map out the layout of the room in my head.
At one point, I hid a sharpened spoon handle under the mattress, not because I thought it would save me, but because it reminded me that I might be able to fight if I needed to. But that was found the second I returned my tray incomplete.
When I close my eyes, I don’t let myself dream of rescue. That seems too far-fetched.
I dream of the moment the locks fail. The moment I hear screaming down the hall. The moment blood stains the carpet and someone—anyone—says my name.
They want me broken.
But I'm of Kavanagh blood too.
And they’re going to regret forgetting that.
I know something’s different the moment the footsteps pause outside my door longer than usual.
I sit on the edge of the bed, arms crossed, muscles stiff. The door clicks open without a knock, and for the first time in seventeen days, I’m not alone with my own mind.
Two women step inside—one older, silver-streaked hair pinned tightly, the other is the young woman who I see every day, eyes downcast, carrying a garment bag like it holds a corpse. Both wear black. Neither says a word.
I stand as they begin setting up. A portable mirror is wheeled in, a collapsible standing screen unfurled in the corner. The older woman places a thick, cream-colored bag on a hook on the closet door.
I stare at it, already knowing what’s inside.
“I didn’t request anything,” I say, voice dry, brittle. “Not a damn thing. Not a dress. Not a circus.”
No response.
The younger woman unzips the bag and pulls out an ivory dress with lace so delicate it might as well be spiderwebs. She moves like her soul isn’t present, like she’s doing this under threat. Maybe she is.
“Do either of you speak?” I demand, voice sharper now. “Do you have names?”
Still nothing.
They guide me behind the screen, their hands quick, clinical, lifting my arms, removing my clothes like I’m a mannequin. I resist the urge to push them off me. It would be pointless. I’d be facing one of the men waiting outside my door.
The dress slides over my body like water. It fits too well. Tailored without ever having measured me in person.
The older woman nods once at the fit, then steps away to retrieve a small box. She unties the ribbon and lifts the lid like it’ssacred. Inside, nestled in cream velvet, is a ring—yellow gold, sharp with emeralds that catch the light like they’ve drawn blood before.
And beneath it…a note.
My stomach turns as she hands it to me. No envelope. Just folded stationery embossed with Anthony Falco’s name
My hands shake as I unfold it. I don’t read it aloud, don’t dare give the words oxygen. But they burn into my eyes anyway.
