Every small detail.
Every movement.
It all fed into something I didn’t want to acknowledge.
Something I couldn’t seem to turn off.
So I tried to distract myself.
To break the tension before it broke me.
Clearing my throat lightly, I spoke.
“So...”
A pause.
“I—”
Another breath.
“—how was your night?”
The question hung between us for a moment longer than I expected.
Then—
His voice came, flat and immediate.
“How was my night? Spectacular, really—if you consider lonely and boring to be spectacular.”
I pressed my lips together.
“You?” he asked, and I blinked, caught off guard.
“Four weeks,” I said quietly, keeping my eyes on the road. “Since you banned me from sleeping in your room. Let’s just say... I’m getting used to it.”
His glance lingered, sharp and almost disbelieving.
“Getting used to loneliness?” he murmured. “No one... truly adapts to loneliness.”
“I am not no-one,” I snapped, the words flying out before I could cage them.
The echo of that night four weeks ago slammed into me again — him holding the door wide, telling me I was unworthy of his bed, unworthy of his warmth, unworthy of anything but solitude.
He tilted his head, eyes narrowing with dark amusement.
I exhaled softly, turning my face toward the window as the estate’s manicured lawns slipped past in a blur of green and gold.
The motion steadied me in a way his presence didn’t.
“Violet—”
“Can we not talk about Violet?”
The words came out sharper than I intended—cutting, immediate.
I didn’t even realize I’d turned until I was already facing him, the tension snapping through me like a wire pulled too tight.
