Chapter 14 Violet
VIOLET
Sleep doesn’t come back after the shower.
I lie in the dark, hair still damp, skin still cold, staring at the ceiling where painted angels judge me with their serene, unbothered faces. The dream replays on a loop behind my eyelids every time I close them. His hands. His mouth. The way dream-me begged for him like breathing.
Elio, please—
I press the heels of my palms against my eyes until I see stars.
By the time dawn light creeps across the plaster, I’ve maybe managed two hours of fractured sleep. My body feels like I’ve been hit by a truck. My mind feels worse.
The door opens at eight. Right on schedule.
My pulse kicks up before I can stop it. Stomach flipping like some kind of trained response, Pavlov’s bitch hearing the dinner bell. I hate it. Hate that my body has learned the rhythm of him, that it responds to his presence before my brain even registers he’s in the room.
He’s the monster. He’s the monster. He’s the—
The mantra feels hollow. Worn thin from overuse.
Elio enters carrying the breakfast tray.
His wearing yet another dark suit, immaculate as always.
The hint of a stubble is gone, his face freshly shaven today, I note against my will.
The way the morning light catches the clean line of his jaw, smooth and sharp, and I hate that I register it at all.
Why does my brain keep doing that? Filing away these stupid, pointless details like they’re evidence of something.
Like he’s someone I’m supposed to study instead of escape
He sets the tray down on the table by the window, and turns to look at me.
“You look tired.”
I bark out a laugh that sounds wrong even to my own ears. “Captivity affects sleep. What did you expect?”
He doesn’t rise to the bait. Just settles into his chair, and studies me with those dark, fathomless eyes.
“Bad dreams?”
My whole body goes rigid. He knows. He has cameras. He watched me thrash and moan and—
“I don’t remember my dreams,” I lie. My voice comes out too flat, too controlled.
Elio’s mouth curves. Not quite a smile. “Pity.”
I don’t ask what he means. Don’t want to know.
Instead, I reach for the coffee cup, my hands shaking slightly despite trying my hardest to keep my cool.
The silence stretches. He watches me drink. Watches me tear a piece of bread into smaller pieces without eating any of them. Watches me avoid his gaze like it costs me something.
Which it does.
Because every time I look at him now, I see dream-him. Hands tangled in my hair. Mouth hot on my skin. The heavy weight of him pressing me into the mattress while I arched up and begged for more, shameless, desperate, alive in a way I’ve never been awake.
Stop it stop it stop it—
“Violet.”
I flinch.
He’s closer than I realized. Standing now, moving around the small table toward me with that quiet, deliberate stride that always makes the room feel smaller. His hand lifts, reaching for my face—
I jerk back so hard I nearly fall off the bed.
“Don’t touch me.”
His hand freezes mid-air. Inches from my cheek.
Something flashes across his face. There and gone so fast I almost miss it, but I don’t miss it. I’ve spent too many days studying him, noticing his tells, searching for cracks in the marble.
Then the mask slides back into place. His hand drops to his side as he takes a step back, putting distance between us that feels wrong even as I’m grateful for it.
“My apologies.” The words come out clipped, too polite, like he’s reading from a script. Nothing like the low rasp that slips into my dreams and stays there long after I wake up. “I overstepped.”
The distance in his voice hurts more than I want it to, more than it has any right to.
Good, I tell myself. This is what you wanted. Boundaries. The monster staying on his side of this cage.
But my body doesn’t agree. My body noticed the hurt in his eyes and filed it away as something that matters. My body wants to close the gap he created, to lean into his warmth, to—
Stop.
I don’t say anything. Can’t find words that won’t betray me.
Elio collects the breakfast tray, every movement so precise, so perfectly controlled, like he’s folding away whatever happened between us just now and putting it somewhere I can’t reach.
That tiny bit of softness that slipped through a second ago—it’s already gone, tucked back behind whatever walls he keeps up, the ones I’m starting to know too well even though I don’t want to.
“I’ll have lunch prepared in the solarium,” he says without meeting my eyes. “The sunlight will be good for you.”
His voice is calm, almost gentle, but it’s the kind of gentle that feels like he’s already halfway out the door in his head.
Then he’s really gone. The door doesn’t lock behind him. It hasn’t locked in days. But I feel the click of it anyway, somewhere deep in my chest.
The solarium is bathed in afternoon light when I arrive.
Jasmine climbs the windows in spirals of green and white. The air is thick with humidity, warm and alive, and despite everything my shoulders loosen the moment I step inside. My body craves this. The sun, the green, the illusion of freedom even as guards hover just outside the glass walls.
The table is in its usual place, barely big enough for the plates arranged across its surface.
Elio is already seated, watching as I approach, his dark eyes tracking my every movement like he’s already decided how this moment ends.
I head for the seat across from him.
Or I mean to.
His hand catches my wrist before I can even pull the chair out. Not rough. Just firm. Present. The kind of hold that doesn’t need to hurt to remind me he’s there.
I should resist. Should yank my arm free, shove the chair back, put the whole damn table between us like I’ve told myself I would a hundred times.
Instead, I sit.
The second my thighs touch the seat, his presses against mine. Heat bleeds through the fabric right away, searing into my skin like it’s been waiting for this. I feel it everywhere, thigh to thigh, the slow burn spreading up my leg, pooling low in my stomach before I can stop it.
I shift away, but his hand lands on my knee, holding me in place.
“Let go.”
He doesn’t. His thumb strokes across my kneecap through the thin fabric of a dress I wore today. Slow. Possessive.
“Stop fighting it, tesoro.”
“Fighting what?” I try to sound bored. Dismissive. Like his touch isn’t sending sparks skittering up my thigh. “Your delusions?”
His laugh is soft. Dark. “You moaned my name in your sleep last night.”
The world tilts.
“Twice,” he adds, like he’s discussing the weather.
Blood rushes to my face so fast I feel dizzy. “You’re delusional.”
“Am I?” His hand slides higher on my thigh. Just an inch. Testing. “Your body knows what it wants, Violet. Even if you won’t admit it.”
I shove his hand away. Stand so fast the chair scrapes against stone.
“You’re an asshole.”
He doesn’t follow. Doesn’t stand. Just leans back in his chair and looks up at me with that infuriating calm. The corner of his mouth lifts. Predatory. Knowing.
“You can run,” he says. “But you’ll come back. We both know it.”
I leave.
Storm through the glass doors and into the corridor beyond, past guards who pretend not to notice, past doorways I’ve memorized, and others I haven’t.
He’s right.
I hate him for being right.
I hate that my body responded to his hand on my thigh. Hate that he heard me moan his name in my sleep. Hate that I had that dream in the first place, that I can’t stop thinking about it, and that some sick, twisted part of me wanted him to slide his hand higher.
What the fuck is wrong with you, Violet?
I don’t have an answer.
Or maybe I do, and that’s worse. Maybe nothing’s wrong. Maybe this is just what wanting feels like when you’re not supposed to want it.
The gallery is quiet when I find it. Soft lamplight pooling on the floor, gilt frames catching just enough gold to gleam. The faint scent of wood polish hangs in the air, mixed with something older, deeper, like old books and candle smoke and time itself.
And the Madonna.
She hangs in the same place she always has.
Mother and child, gold halo catching the light, blue robes that seem to glow even in the dimness.
Serene. Unreachable. The kind of beauty that makes your chest ache if you look too long, like she’s holding something you’ll never have and never lose at the same time
I stand in front of her, arms loose at my sides, breathing in the quiet. Like if I stay still long enough, I might borrow a little of her calm, her strength.
Then I hear him enter.
“Avoiding me?”
I don’t turn around. “Trying to.”
“And yet here you are.” His footsteps approach. Stop too close behind me. “In my my gallery.”
“You make it difficult,” I say. “The trying.”
“Good.” His voice is low. Rough. “That’s the point.”
I should step forward. Put distance between us. But my feet won’t move.
He’s changed since lunch. White shirt now, sleeves rolled to his elbows, top buttons undone like he’s finally let go of some of the armor he wears all day.
The hollow of his throat catches the light, shadowed and open.
Chest hair dark against olive skin, a few strands just above where the fabric parts.
And something else. Ink curling along his collarbone, black lines twisting and disappearing beneath the white linen.
Tattoos.
He has tattoos. All this time, under his pristine, pressed linen…
He didn’t have them in my dream.
Stop looking stop looking stop—
He reaches for my face.
“Don’t.” I try to pull away. He catches my chin anyway.
His grip is firm. Controlling. Not asking permission.
“You recoiled this morning,” he states as his thumb brushes along my jaw. “Why?”
“Because you’re a psycho.”
Something flickers in his eyes. Not anger. Something darker. Hungrier.
“Your pupils dilate when I’m near.” His voice drops lower, dripping with intimacy. “Your breathing changes. And your nipples—”