15.
Sunday evenings used to be her favorite. Before the blood. Before the silence grew teeth.
Before she learned that being seen could feel like being hunted.
Now, the apartment was so quiet, her own heartbeat echoed off the walls.
Isolde wore a soft cotton dress the color of cream, its hem brushing her knees.
Her hair was in a loose side braid, strands falling around her face like the petals of something wilting.
She hummed quietly a nervous habit-as she wiped down the wooden countertops of the tiny café-style kitchenette in her aunt's old flat.
It had taken hours to clean the bloodstains from the floor, but she'd done it.
Something in her needed to reclaim this space. Even if it was haunted. Even if she was the ghost.
The rain had stopped, but the clouds were the color of bruises. Dusk bled in through the windows.
And then-the doorbell rang.
Her body froze.
She turned, rag still in her hand, heart suddenly too loud.
One step at a time, she crossed the small apartment, dress swaying lightly with her movement.
She opened the door. No one. But something sat on the doormat.
A black box. Tied with a red silk ribbon.
She stared at it like it might whisper.
Her hands moved on their own.
She picked it up.
Took it inside.
Set it on the kitchen counter. Untied the ribbon. Lifted the lid. Screamed.
Inside-was a heart.
A beating one.
Still warm. Red. Veined. Wet. Throbbing slowly as if by some unnatural defiance of death.
Isolde stumbled backward, knocking over a stool. Her eyes locked on the horror pulsing within the silk-lined box.
Her hands trembled as she reached for her phone.
She would call the police.
She had to-
But before her fingers touched the screen...
The lightbulb above her flickered. And the air changed. The door slammed shut.
And from the darkness behind her, a voice-low, rich, and laced with velvet cruelty. "You're crying. And I haven't even touched you yet."
She spun. He was there. She knew it was him her tormentor the secret admirer he called himself.
He wore a mask that made her breath catch in her throat a skeletal face molded from white porcelain, the cheekbones high and severe, the eye holes hollow and black, lips carved into a cruel half-smile.
It looked like something an executioner would wear in a nightmare opera.
Beneath it, a black dress shirt clung to his torso, the sleeves rolled, revealing veined forearms.
The buttons were undone halfway, exposing the carved planes of his chest and a silver pendant resting just above his heart a single letter: I.
For Isolde.
He moved toward her with slow, sinuous grace, like a shadow stalking the edge of a flame.
She stepped back. "No-please-"
He didn't speak. He simply reached.
And in one smooth, inhuman motion, he swept her off her feet hands firm around her thighs-and pulled her down to the floor.
Her back hit the rug with a gasp, her legs suddenly on either side of his waist, his body pressing into hers with controlled dominance.
The heat of him pressed against her. Controlled. Arrogant. Dangerous.
Isolde gasped, breath stolen by fear, heart hammering.
Her braid fanned beneath her, cheeks flushed from exertion and terror.
Her legs trembled, trapped on either side of him. Her cotton dress bunched at her waist, revealing creamy thighs he didn't yet touch-but claimed with his stare.
She struggled, eyes wide, breath caught.
"Get off-"
His gloved hand slid up her thigh-not touching, just resting. Holding her there.
"I told you, Isolde," he murmured, voice low, eyes unseen behind the mask. "No one touches what belongs to me."
She shook her head, lips trembling. "I don't-I'm not yours-"
"But you are," he said, leaning in closer, the porcelain mouth of the mask brushing her temple. "You just haven't admitted it yet."
She sobbed once, her chest rising beneath the soft cotton of her dress.
She tried to push him off.
He caught her wrists, pinned them gently above her head.
"I don't want you," she whispered, voice shaking.
"You're a terrible liar," Dante growled softly.
His mask dipped lower. She felt the edge of it against her cheek, cold and unyielding. His breath was hot at her jaw. "You want to know what devotion looks like?"
He reached into his coat. Tossed something onto the floor beside her.
She turned her head. And choked. Lucien's watch.Still stained red.
She whimpered. "No... no..."
"Yes."
"You're afraid," he whispered. "But you're not running. You're shaking, but your legs are wrapped around me like they know where they belong."
She stilled.
Something shifted in her eyes.
Fear. Shame. Want.
Dante lifted one hand, brushing her braid back from her face, fingers grazing her skin like a vow.
And then he leaned down beside her ear and whispered "That heart in the box? It was Lucien's. The boy who asked to love you. He looked at you with warmth. I looked at him with fire. Now his heart beats only for you... once more."
FLASHBACK
Two days earlier.
Lucien was sitting on a stone ledge near the bridge, feeding crumbs to birds, earbuds in, scrolling through photos of Isolde from the café's social account.
He smiled to himself-soft, hopeful, stupid.He didn't see the man in the alley. Didn't hear the second man behind him.
A syringe sunk into his neck.
Everything went black.
An hour later, Lucien awoke bound to a chair. Naked. Cold. Eyes wide.
He was in a dark chamber beneath Dante's private estate. The stone walls dripped with condensation. Chains clinked faintly.
And across the room, Dante sat shirtless, blade in hand, the skeleton mask resting on a hook beside him.
Lucien blinked. "Where...?"
"I heard," Dante said, rising with slow grace, "you asked my girl to the park."
Lucien blinked. "Who are you-?"
Dante moved behind him. Cracked a knuckle. "You'll know who I am when you stop screaming."
He began with the kneecaps crushed them with a mallet, slow and methodical.
Lucien screamed. Begged. Cried. Then the carving knife came.
Thin, curved. Sharp enough to separate skin from muscle.
He didn't kill him quickly.
He bled him first. Made him see the pain.
Dante whispered every detail of Isolde's face into Lucien's ear as he flayed his back open.
"You don't get to speak her name. You don't get to breathe with a heart that beat for someone she might've loved."
And finally he took that heart. Still beating.
And wrapped it, delicately, in silk.
PRESENT
Isolde sobbed beneath him, wrists still pinned. "You killed him."
"I warned you, dove. Every man who dares look at you that way... will die with my name in their throat."
She gasped, a sound like broken glass."No..."
Her hands pushed weakly against his chest.
"You're insane-please-why are you doing this to me?" she cried now.
He tilted his head. "Because love isn't kind. It's devouring. I warned you."
"I didn't ask for this!"
"But you kept the dress," he growled softly. "You kept the perfume. You held the choker like a prayer. And now this is your altar."
Tears slipped down her cheeks.
"I hate you," she whispered.
His masked face hovered inches from hers. "You will. Until you ache for me."
He leaned closer.
His body pressed hard into hers, every inch of him radiating heat and threat.
"I'm devoted," he whispered. "You call it madness. I call it love stripped of pretense."
Her lip trembled. Tears spilled freely. "Please..." she begged, "just leave me alone..."
But he lowered his head again.
Mouth hovering above her ear. "You'll beg me to stay when you learn what it feels like to have a god fall in love with your ruin."
And with that, he stood. Left her breathless on the rug.
As he reached the door, he turned his head slightly. "See you soon"
The door clicked shut behind him. And Isolde lay there.
And Lucien's heart still beating in a box across the room.