Total pages in book: 42
Estimated words: 38942 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 195(@200wpm)___ 156(@250wpm)___ 130(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 38942 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 195(@200wpm)___ 156(@250wpm)___ 130(@300wpm)
"And then?"
"And then life took a different turn." His expression closes slightly. "That's a story for another time, perhaps."
I don't push. We each have our boundaries, our private spaces. Perhaps in time, those boundaries will shift. For now, I'm grateful for even this small insight.
We finish our tea in companionable silence, the fire crackling softly, rain still pattering against the windows. Despite the strangeness of my situation, despite the fact that I married a stranger today, I feel a curious sense of calm.
When I finally rise to go to bed, Gabriele stands as well.
"Thank you," I say, though I'm not entirely sure what I'm thanking him for. The tea? The fire? The brief glimpse into his past?
"Sleep well, Kleah." His voice is gentle in a way I haven't heard before.
In my room, I change into the soft nightclothes provided, sliding between sheets that feel impossibly luxurious against my skin. Despite my earlier certainty that sleep would elude me, I find my eyelids growing heavy, my thoughts slowing.
My last conscious thought is of Gabriele sitting by the fire, firelight casting shadows across his face, his voice soft as he spoke of his grandmother.
My husband.
Perhaps not such a stranger after all.
GABRIELE
She sleeps now, in the east wing of the house.
My wife.
The title sits strangely in my mind, foreign and familiar at once. I've never imagined myself married, never saw it as part of my possible future. Yet here I am, bound by law and word to a woman I barely know.
Outside, the storm continues, wind driving rain against glass in steady percussion. It suits my mood—this restless, elemental force contained behind civilized barriers.
I move to the windows, watching lightning illuminate the churning sea beyond. Kleah Martell—Kleah Bronzetti now—is unlike anyone I expected to find. I imagined someone... fragile. Someone who would crumble under the weight of revelation, who would need to be managed rather than partnered.
Instead, I found a woman of quiet strength and surprising resilience. A woman who absorbs impossible truths and adapts to them, who faces fear without being consumed by it.
A woman who made pasta tonight, as if the simple act of cooking might restore normalcy to a world turned upside down.
There's something disarming about her directness, her emotional honesty. In my world, such transparency is dangerous—a weakness to be exploited. Yet she wields it almost like a shield, her genuineness creating a space around her that seems to demand authenticity in return.
I find myself telling her things I hadn't planned to share—small truths, but truths nonetheless. It's unexpected and unsettling, this pull toward openness with her.
I turn away from the window, moving through the darkened house to my office. Work is the answer—it always has been. Plans to make, security to reinforce, intelligence to analyze. Valentina's next move to anticipate.
But as I pass the east wing, I find myself pausing, listening. The house is quiet save for the storm outside. Is she truly sleeping? Or lying awake like me, mind racing with too many questions?
Our strange union is barely hours old. A marriage of necessity, of protection rather than passion. Yet already I feel a responsibility toward her that goes beyond my promise to Viktor. Something more personal, more... human.
In my office, I rebuild the fire mechanically, muscle memory guiding my hands in the dark. When it's burning steadily again, I take the letter from my pocket and read it one final time. Then, with deliberate care, I hold it to the flames.
The heavy paper resists at first, then catches, curling as fire consumes it. I watch until nothing remains but ash, the final words of a dead man transformed into heat and light.
A new beginning. A clean slate. Whatever happens now will be between Kleah and me, unburdened by Viktor's shadow.
I sit in the armchair, watching the fire grow stronger, listening to the storm begin to fade. Dawn will come soon, and with it, the first day of our strange new reality.
Upstairs, Kleah sleeps in the east wing, my protection and my responsibility.
My wife.
She'll never be afraid in my hands, I promise silently. Not of me, not of anyone. Never again.
I don't know how long I sit there, thoughts drifting between strategy and unexpected sentiment. Eventually, I must doze, because I wake with a start as the first light of dawn creeps through the windows.
The storm has passed. The fire has died. And somewhere in this house, Kleah Bronzetti is beginning to stir.
Chapter Five
KLEAH
FOR A BLISSFUL MOMENT between sleep and wakefulness, I forget where I am, who I am now.
Then reality floods back. The safe house. The marriage. Gabriele.
My husband.
The title still feels foreign, surreal. I'm married to a man I've known for mere days. A man who moves like a predator and speaks like a philosopher. A man who built me a fire and made me tea from his grandmother's recipe.