Five
The mansion was too quiet. Like it was holding its breath.
Elena stood in the grand foyer, arms folded tightly around herself, staring up at the massive chandelier that glittered like a frozen explosion above her head. It didn’t belong in a house it belonged in a palace. Or maybe a museum. Everything in Dante Virello’s world seemed too sharp, too intentional. Nothing was simply beautiful; it was designed to make you feel small.
Much like the man himself.
“I take it you’re not settling in well.”
His voice came from the top of the marble staircase. Dante stood there, dressed in another sleek suit, black shirt open at the collar. No tie. No smile.
Just the man she was now married to. And still knew nothing about.
“I didn’t realize I needed to settle in,” Elena replied, her tone more brittle than she intended. “I wasn’t exactly consulted on the move.”
“Consultation implies choice.” He descended slowly, each step deliberate. “And we’re far past that.”
She turned, lifting her chin. “So this is it. I live here now. With you.”
“You’re my wife,” he said evenly. “Where else would you be?”
A flare of resentment rose in her chest, hot and sharp. “I don’t know. At home. In my room. Pretending this was all a terrible dream.”
“This is your home now, Elena,” he said. “And dreams don’t end with legal contracts and a bloodthirsty press watching.”
She hated the way he said her name. Not cruelly never that. But with a kind of quiet finality, like he’d already carved it into stone beside his own. Elena Virello. It sounded like a branding. Not a union.
“Your room is at the end of the left wing,” he continued, stepping closer. “Mine is opposite. You have privacy. Security. And freedom within the boundaries I allow.”
“Generous.”
His mouth curved just slightly. “Sarcasm is wasted here, Elena. I’ve heard sharper tongues and buried most of them.”
She stared at him. “Is that supposed to scare me?”
“It should.”
He turned, walking past her without another word, heading into what looked like a sitting room lined with bookshelves and low-burning sconces. Elena hesitated, then followed him.
“What do you want from me?” she asked, her voice cracking at the edges.
Dante didn’t turn around. He moved to a sleek cabinet and poured himself a glass of something amber and expensive. “Does it bother you so much not to know?”
“Yes. Because everything about you is calculated.”
“I’d hope so. Emotion is a liability.”
“And marriage?” she snapped. “What’s that? A chess move?”
He finally turned, glass in hand, watching her. “Marriage, Elena, is control. Of narrative. Of bloodline. Of enemies.”
“And me.”
“Yes.”
There was no apology in the word. Just truth.
She wanted to scream at him. To throw something. But instead she just stared, breathing shallowly, a strange mixture of fury and fascination tightening her chest.
“You don’t scare me,” she lied.
He stepped forward, slowly, predator-smooth. “You should be scared. Not of me. But of what you don’t yet understand.”
Something unspoken crackled between them.
She broke it first. “I want to see my sister.”
Dante raised a brow. “Which one?”
“Elara.”
His jaw tightened. “The one who called you after the wedding?”
“I deserve to speak to her.”
“She’s being watched,” he said. “But you can call her. Once.”
Elena narrowed her eyes. “You really think she’s a threat?”
“She’s your sister. And Victor’s daughter. I think she’s smart and loyal. Not to you.”
She opened her mouth, but the sharp trill of Dante’s phone interrupted. He answered without looking at her.
“Speak.”
Whoever was on the line talked fast. Urgent. Elena couldn’t hear the words, but she could see the flicker of annoyance maybe rage behind Dante’s otherwise unreadable eyes.
“I’ll be there in twenty,” he said shortly, then ended the call. His gaze cut back to her. “Stay inside. Don’t answer the door for anyone.”
“And if I do?”
“Then you’ll learn what consequences look like.”
He left without another word, coat already swinging over his shoulder. The door slammed behind him like a judgment.
Elena didn’t stay in her room.
She explored.
The Virello estate was old money reimagined cold marble floors, oil paintings that looked disturbingly real, halls long enough to lose yourself in. She found a library, a solarium, a gallery of weapons she hoped was for show and then a locked door with a biometric scanner.
Her curiosity bloomed dangerously.
Was this where he kept his secrets?
She tried her thumb. Nothing. Pressed her face against the wood, listening. Silence.
Elena turned away, annoyed at herself. She’d been here less than a day and already she was acting like a spy.
She found the kitchen next. To her surprise, it wasn’t empty.
A woman in her mid-forties stood at the island, chopping something with swift, elegant hands.
“You must be Mrs. Virello.”
Elena blinked. “You know who I am?”
The woman gave a smile warm, real, and startling. “Everyone does. I’m Nora. I’ve worked here for years.”
“And you’re not… afraid of him?”
Nora laughed. “Terrified. But also grateful. He saved my son once. And he pays well.”
Elena looked around the gleaming kitchen. “Do people actually live here?”
“We do. You can too. If you stop acting like a guest in your own home.”
Elena frowned. “It doesn’t feel like mine.”
“It will. Or it won’t. Either way, you’re in it now.”
Nora placed a cup of something hot in front of her. “Tea. And before you ask it’s not poisoned.”
Elena actually smiled. A little. “Thanks.”
The two women sat in the hush of the kitchen, steam rising between them like truce.
That night, she couldn’t sleep.
The silence was too thick. The bed too big. Her name on the wall beside Dante’s in gilded letters felt like a joke.
Sometime past midnight, she left her room and wandered. The halls looked different in the dark less like a home, more like a crypt.
She found herself standing outside Dante’s door before she realized what she was doing.
It was cracked open.
“Elena.”
His voice stopped her breath. He was standing near the window, shirt unbuttoned, tattoos cutting down his chest like inked shadows.
“What are you doing here?”
“I don’t know.”
He said nothing. Just watched her.
She stepped inside. “I can’t sleep.”
He nodded once. “You’ll get used to the quiet.”
“I don’t think I want to.”
She hesitated. Then, because fear and bravery were sometimes twins, she said: “Did you ever love anyone?”
Dante’s eyes darkened. “No.”
“Why not?”
“Because love is a leash.”
She took another step forward. “And hate?”
He smirked, tired. “Hate is freedom.”
Elena studied him, this man who was now her husband by force, by fury, by fate.
“I’m not afraid of you, Dante.”
“I know.”
She turned to leave.
“Elena.”
She paused.
He didn’t move. But his voice dropped, low and quiet and dangerous. “Don’t ever walk into a lion’s den thinking the lion has forgotten how to bite.”
She met his eyes. “And don’t marry a girl with a cage on her back and expect her not to grow wings.”
For the first time, something like surprise flickered across his face.
She left without another word.
But neither of them slept.