Vows of Silence (The Black Veil Duet #1)

Chapter 1

The Flame

Luca: You can say no. I will protect you.

I reread the text, biting my lip until I tasted blood. Luca had a habit of making things seem so simple. Truly believing my voice held any weight, as if he wasn’t painfully aware of how much I was ignored around here.

However, I didn’t want to argue over this again. Our easy-going friendship was rapidly developing into feeling like we were a married couple who resented one another. We were bickering over the same thing almost daily, and it was getting tedious to say the least.

So, I decided to try a different tactic rather than engaging with him over the real issue.

Isabelle: You and I both know I have a problem with saying no. Isn’t that why you’re still around?

I added a smiley-faced emoji to the end of my text, as well as a monkey covering its eyes, just so he knew I was joking.

Kind of.

Luca: Isabelle.

Good grief.

One word and my toes were curling. As always.

I could practically hear his growl radiating from the text, the delicious, deep rumble of his voice crawling over my skin, leaving goosebumps everywhere.

It was utter madness the effect this man’s voice had on me. Especially considering we had never even met. I didn’t even know what he looked like, but somehow that didn’t matter. Not for us two. Not for what we shared.

Isabelle: Have I said something wrong?

I replied with a smirk emoji, sinking back down into my bed, hoping he would follow my flirty direction and give me the distraction I so desperately needed.

It wasn’t the direction I had intended on taking this, but if he could jump on board, tell me to strip and then throw a few commands my way? Well, it certainly beat arguing, that’s for sure.

Luca: Sit back up. What part of this conversation felt like an invitation to lay down without permission?

My eyes shot to my laptop, which was still propped up from my earlier doomscrolling session.

Damn him.

Isabelle: I don’t need your permission to lay down, asshole.

Luca: Wrong. But I’ll punish you for that another time. I need you to listen to me. Sit. Up.

Rolling my eyes, I blew a kiss towards the camera and followed his instructions, sitting back up on my bed, crossing my legs and letting my long, dark hair fall over my shoulders and down my chest, partially concealing my face from him.

Luca: Wrong camera. But it was a nice attempt.

I extended my middle finger and put my phone down on the bed, not bothering to reply.

He wouldn’t mind. That was the beauty of Luca—he was always there, never taking more than a few minutes to reply to me, no matter the time.

He wasn’t needy or demanding. I could disappear for hours on end, and he never punished me for it or forced an explanation from me. He was just there.

Sometimes it felt like Luca was the only light in my life. The lifeline when I was drowning. But he was the opposite of light—he lingered in the dark. The mysterious, hidden piece of my life. The one thing that belonged to me completely.

He was my respite and calm in the chaos. And yet somehow the cause of all the chaotic feelings I had. He’d appeared out of thin air, like a shadow come to life, and it was like he had always been there.

Wow, Isabelle. Heavy on the symbolism there, I thought to myself mockingly.

But it was true. He came from nowhere and took over everything.

And by everything, I do mean everything.

From that very first text message, he let it be known that he could see me at any moment.

He never hid the fact that he had cameras here, that he had access to parts of my life he should never have been able to hack his way into.

And it hadn’t occurred to me for a second to fear him.

Which was why I had probably told him more than I should have. Let him into the parts of my brain I had no business sharing with anyone else. Especially when…

Luca: Where did you disappear to?

Isabelle: I was just thinking.

Goddamn. Even knowing that he was watching me all the time, it still took me by surprise every now and then just how much he actually saw.

Luca: Get out of your head, little ember, and plaster a smile on your face. Your mother is on her way upstairs.

Isabelle: Get a hobby or something, Luca.

I put my phone back down without waiting for a reply, and hurried off my bed, walking over to the window at the other end of the vast bedroom.

It put a little bit of space between me and her, which was exactly what I needed lately.

She had never been what you would call a “hands-on” type of parent. She was happy for me to come and go as I pleased, so long as I remained in contact one way or another. A simple text to let her know where I was, sharing my location, or even just a voice note telling her I was safe.

But lately? Lately she was something else. Ever since the engagement, she’d been almost overbearing. My whole family was.

The freedom I had once known, the feeling of being invisible… it had all been snatched away.

And it wasn’t just my family, either. There was also Luca, who felt entitled to every damn part of me. But there was something else. Something that felt far more sinister. As though it wasn’t watching out for my safety. It was watching for an opening.

My mother floated into the bedroom less than a minute later, her sing-song voice ringing out my name as she entered without knocking.

Another thing that had never happened before the engagement, I thought to myself bitterly.

“Isabelle!” she scolded when she finally noticed me. Though she was born in Britain, she had taken to pronouncing my name with a Z—Eezabelle. My father was Italian, and she thought trying to mimic his accent made her sound more sophisticated.

She had visited Italy precisely two times, and both of those occasions she had spent shopping, not soaking up the phenomenal culture and history bleeding into every inch of the country.

Not so sophisticated after all.

But we weren’t supposed to mention that.

“Hi, Mum. What’s up?” I asked when she repeated my name, not rising to her tone of voice.

“Why are you hiding in your bedroom?” she demanded, ushering in the staff behind her.

I watched as woman after woman poured into my room. Some carrying fabrics, others underskirts and tulle, and others laden with makeup, creams, hair products, and enough bath salts to alter my pH balance permanently.

“I’m not hiding, I promise,” I said softly, not wanting to be drawn into another argument with her. “You were busy when I came home. Frank took me to Dad’s office to check in, but he was on a business call, so I came up here until I was needed.”

Frank was my head guard. Wherever I was, Frank wasn’t too far behind. And lately, whenever I returned home, he had taken to depositing me in front of my dad, as though I needed inspecting at every second to ensure no damage had come to me.

Why the daughter of a real estate manager needed guards was anyone’s guess, but that’s the world I lived in.

And I can’t say I was complaining—at least not lately. I looked out of my window, shivering slightly as the familiar feeling of being watched crept over my skin.

It had been happening more and more lately.

Which was weird, considering Luca had been watching my every move for almost three years now.

But Luca had never felt sinister. And what was out there, what I felt now…

it felt dangerous. It didn’t warm me the way Luca’s observations did. It chilled me to my bones.

I pushed past the feeling, grounding myself in reality by following my anxiety techniques.

Five things I could see—the gardeners working on the maze, trimming the tall walls until they were neat and orderly.

The guards standing watch at the door, or walking the grounds, laughing and joking with one another.

The dogs running free in the courtyard. The maids hanging out the washing.

And the cars coming down the long path, no doubt filled with yet more businessmen waiting for a meeting with my father.

Our estate was a thing of beauty and the source of all my childhood happiness. I could see the huge cherry blossom tree from here, and the swing my dad had attached for me and my brother, Marco.

I could just about make out the lake, where my father had taught us both to fish, how to row the boat, and where my mother had taught me all about the flowers and wildlife that were in abundance.

The gardens were where my birthday parties had been hosted, where I’d fallen in love—and back out again—for the first time at age twelve.

Everything was here, all wrapped up in one big, beautiful bow.

And yet, one business deal had ruined everything.

The house no longer felt like a haven. It felt like hell. A maximum-security prison for a crime I hadn’t committed—other than being born female.

“Just put it in the corner!” my mother snapped, bringing my attention back to her.

“What is all of this?” I asked her, slowly walking back over to her and the chaos, warily eyeing up my bed as it slowly became a dumping ground for all the evening dresses.

“Adrien has pushed forward the engagement party,” she announced with a huff. “No, not that one,” she said, directing her words at one of the maids as she pushed away one of the belts being handed to her.

“Why?” I asked, narrowly dodging a maid carrying a large box, ducking down just in time as she carried it above my head and over to the floor-length mirror.

“Why does that man do anything?” my mother replied with a snap. “He says he has a business meeting in Belarus the following week that he simply cannot miss. I’d argue that he has double booked, and should have told everyone he was busy rather than making us the second option, but what do I know?”

“And bringing it forward made more sense than… Oh, I don’t know, postponing?”

“Postponing?” my mother said, dropping what she was holding and standing tall, turning to face me. “Isabelle, you shouldn’t even joke about such things!” For a brief moment, her face had paled, her hands wringing in front of her, wrinkling the silken material she had been holding.

Then, with her hands trembling, she threw the scrap of material on my bed, smoothed down her dress and rushed over to the en-suite bathroom, effectively ending the conversation.

As if that would work on me. I knew she was hiding something. Being watched has that effect on someone—you learn to see what others don’t always want you to see. You become more observant, almost more sneaky.

So why had the thought of postponing the engagement party made her so scared?

There was no point asking her. She would wave me away and tell me I was being silly. My mother may slip up sometimes, but she never needed long to compose herself. Her little blip a second ago would be long forgotten by now.

I had no choice but to ask him again, even though we had discussed this thousands of times before.

I grabbed my phone off the bed, just in time before it was covered in silk, and fired off a text.

Isabelle: What do you know of Adrien Vescari?

Luca: Other than he’s a dead man? Other than he’s a pathetic piece of shit who needed to order himself a child bride?

I rolled my eyes. That was far more of a dramatic response than I was used to.

Isabelle: I’m not a child.

Luca: You are compared to him! He’s thirty-five!

Isabelle: You’re thirty. And we’ve done far more than me and Adrien have…

Luca: Really, Isabelle? Really? You’re going to compare me to that piece of shit?

Because I can assure you, I have never had to force a woman into marriage before.

Nor would I want to. And not only is he forcing you, he’s doing it so quickly you don’t have time to change your mind! Why else would he bring it forward?

Ahh.

Luca was watching the cameras. Naturally.

Isabelle: I’m not being forced.

Luca: Oh, no, of course you’re not. I completely misunderstood last week when you spent an hour crying on the phone and demanded I come rescue you and take you away.

Isabelle: That was the week of my period. It’s really unfair to hold someone’s hormones against them.

Luca: It’s also really unfair to force a twenty-one-year-old to marry a man almost twice her age.

Well… he had me there.

Isabelle: Can we get back to my original question, please? What do you know about Adrien?

I waited for a response, seeing the chat bubble appear and disappear numerous times.

Isabelle: Please, Luca. None of this makes any sense to me. You must know something. You must have researched.

“Absolutely not,” I replied to one of the maids as she held up a red dress for me to inspect.

Not my style at all.

I looked back down at my phone, only to see that Luca’s response was to send me the Wikipedia article on the Vescari family.

Isabelle: Ha, ha. That was so incredibly helpful. I never thought of using the internet before.

Luca: You’re welcome. Also, good call staying away from that red dress. It looks cheap.

Isabelle: Learn what sarcasm is. And turn the cameras off, freak!

I slammed my phone down on the table with more force than was necessary and took a deep, calming breath.

It was clear that no one was going to give me the answers I needed.

Why, in this day and age, had my father entered me into an arranged marriage?

Why had he chosen Adrien, a billionaire tycoon with the world at his feet?

He clearly had no problem getting the attention of women, and if the gossip rags were to be believed, he had a new girlfriend every other week. So what use did he have for me?

Why had my mother, who had often complained about losing her own freedom to an arranged marriage, agreed to such a thing for her daughter?

And why had she looked so goddamn scared at the thought of displeasing Mr I-Need-A-Wife Vescari?

Because nobody should be that afraid of a man they were about to welcome into the family.