52 - What Flickers in the Dark
Scarlett gasped, her fingers instinctively finding his wrist, gripping it with unexpected force. "What happened?" Her voice had lost all its earlier confidence, replaced by a childlike vulnerability that caught Ethan off guard.
He felt for his phone in his pocket, pulling it out and clicking the side button, but the screen remained obstinately dark. "Battery's dead," he muttered. "Something must be wrong with the main power supply. Let me check."
He started to move away, but Scarlett's grip tightened, fingers digging into his skin like she was afraid he might disappear if she loosened them.
"No, Ethan," she said again, softer this time. "Don't leave me here."
The confession slipped out before she could stop it. She swallowed.
For a split second, something unexpected stirred inside him.
Not the calculating CEO.
Not the man who thrived on control.
A boy—long buried under discipline and expectations—lifted his head.
Ethan huffed a quiet breath, tilting his head slightly toward where he knew her face must be. "You sound like you're five," he murmured, voice low, teasing despite himself. "What's next—want me to check under the couch for monsters?"
She made a small, offended sound. "This isn't funny."
"No," he said, the corner of his mouth twitching in the dark, "but your timing is."
There was the faintest pause—then her fingers tightened again, betraying her.
"I hate the dark.
Ethan stilled, surprised by the genuine fear threading through her words. In all their months of marriage—this arrangement of convenience—he'd never seen her afraid of anything. His free hand found her waist in the darkness, an anchor of warmth and reassurance.
"Alright," he said, his voice gentler than she'd ever heard it. "Stay close. Where's your phone?"
"In the living room," she admitted, shifting closer until her shoulder pressed against his chest.
"Then hold onto me, and let's go get it."
Scarlett's fingers slid down from his wrist to intertwine with his, clutching tightly as they navigated through the darkened house.
The gesture was so natural, so unguarded, that neither commented on it—this new territory they found themselves in, where the boundaries of their carefully negotiated arrangement had begun to blur.
Once they retrieved her phone, its weak light casting eerie shadows through the living room, Ethan called security.
The guard's voice crackled through the speaker, explaining that a fire at the main electricity board had caused the outage across the entire estate. It would take hours to restore power.
Scarlett exhaled sharply, running a hand through her hair. "Great. What now?" She glanced around the shadowy room, the darkness pressing in from all sides. "Are there any candles?"
Ethan moved to a drawer in the sideboard, rummaging through it with practiced familiarity. "There should be some emergency supplies in here." After a moment, he extracted several thick pillar candles and a lighter.
One by one, he struck the lighter.
Flame flared, then settled—small, steady suns pushing the darkness back inch by inch.
Shadows loosened their grip on the room, retreating from sharp corners and steel lines, until the stark modern space softened, transformed by a warm, amber glow.
The house felt different now. Quieter. Almost alive.
Ethan moved with measured precision, placing each candle deliberately, like he was restoring balance to something that had slipped out of alignment.
As he straightened, his gaze lifted—and caught.
Scarlett stood a few steps away, half-lit by the flicker, half-swallowed by shadow. Candlelight traced the curve of her cheek, kissed the copper in her hair, softened the tension in her posture. Without the armor of brightness and control, she looked... unguarded. Real.
He paused.
Just for a heartbeat.
Long enough to register the way her lashes cast shadows beneath her eyes. The way her lips parted slightly as she breathed. The quiet strength in her stillness.
Something warm tugged low in his chest—unexpected, unwelcome.
Scarlett didn't notice. She was watching the flames, not him.
Ethan looked away first.
He set the last candle down and stepped back, the moment folding in on itself like it had never existed—but the image of her, bathed in firelight, lingered behind his eyes long after.
As Ethan arranged the last candle on the coffee table, Scarlett's gaze wandered to a shelf of rarely-used board games and card decks—relics from the previous owners that neither had bothered to discard.
Her eyes lit up as she spotted a familiar box, and she moved toward it with unexpected eagerness.
"Ethan," she called out, grabbing the pack of UNO cards from the shelf, a genuine smile spreading across her face. "I'm bored. Let's play."
He barely glanced up from where he was adjusting a candle. "Not interested," he replied flatly, his tone suggesting the matter was closed.
Scarlett narrowed her eyes, studying his profile in the candlelight. A realization dawned on her, and her lips curved into a mischievous smile. "Wait... do you not know how to play?"
Ethan shot her a pointed look, but his silence was more telling than any denial.
A slow, incredulous smile spread across Scarlett's face, lighting her features with unexpected delight. "You don't! Oh my God, Ethan Blackwood, the genius CEO, doesn't know how to play UNO."
"It's a children's game," he muttered, a defensive edge creeping into his voice as he straightened, brushing imaginary dust from his slacks.
"And yet, you don't know how to play it." Her smile widened into a full-fledged grin, her eyes sparkling with mirth in the candlelight. She moved closer, brandishing the deck. "Don't worry, I'll teach you."
Before he could protest further, she was sinking gracefully to the floor, crossing her legs beneath her as she patted the space beside her in invitation.
Ethan hesitated, looking distinctly out of place in his tailored shirt and expensive trousers, before reluctantly lowering himself to the floor across from her.
Scarlett shuffled the cards with surprising dexterity, her slender fingers moving in a blur.
"Okay, so the basic premise is simple," she explained, dealing seven cards to each of them.
Her enthusiasm was palpable, animation returning to a face that was usually guarded in his presence.
"You match either the number or the color of the card that's played before you. "
Ethan found himself watching instead of playing.
His gaze followed the way the light traced her profile, the gentle curve of her mouth when she smiled, the way her eyes sharpened with playful focus. The room felt smaller somehow—contained within the space between them and the quiet glow of the candles.
He listened. Really listened.
And somewhere between her laughter and the soft slap of cards hitting the floor, something inside him shifted—subtle, but undeniable. A tightening low in his chest. A sense of awareness he hadn't invited.
He started noticing things.
Small things.
The way she bit her lower lip when she hesitated, brows knitting in concentration.
The spark in her eyes when she laid down a ruthless card, glancing up at him like she'd just won a private battle.
The unconscious habit of tucking her hair behind her ear, fingertips brushing her skin, leaving warmth behind.
Each movement felt intimate in the hush of candlelight.
Human.
Endearing.
Games blurred together. Laughter replaced tension. The air between them softened, heavy not with conflict, but with something quieter—something neither of them acknowledged, but both felt settling into place.
Their first game stretched into a second, then a third, their initial awkwardness melting away with each round. When Scarlett finally played her last card in the fourth game, she shot to her feet with a triumphant laugh, twirling around in a spontaneous victory dance, arms raised overhead.
Ethan blinked, caught completely off guard by this uninhibited display of joy. Scarlett seemed to suddenly realize what she'd done, her eyes widening as her hands flew to her face in embarrassment, cheeks flushing pink beneath her fingertips.
And then Ethan did something that surprised them both—he burst out laughing. Not a polite chuckle or a sardonic smirk, but genuine, unreserved laughter that transformed his face, erasing years of carefully cultivated stoicism.
Scarlett's hands slowly lowered, her expression one of wonder as she peered at him. "Did you just—did you just laugh?"
The sound faded, and Ethan cleared his throat, composing himself with visible effort. "Nothing," he replied, the corner of his mouth still twitching treacherously.
She studied him in the candlelight, her head tilted slightly, a small smile playing at her lips. "Ethan," she said softly, her voice threaded with something new, something tender, "you look handsome when you laugh."
He went still, the warmth in his eyes dimming slightly as though a door was closing. The moment stretched between them, taut with unspoken implications.
"Why'd you stop?" she asked.
She had settled beside him without realizing it, close enough that her knee brushed his. The candle between them flickered, throwing soft light across his face, close enough now that she could see the tension still lingering in his jaw.
"Nothing," he said.
But his eyes never left her.
The word didn't match the way his gaze held hers—steady, intent, as if he were seeing something he hadn't planned to notice. The silence stretched, thickening. Not awkward. Charged.
Scarlett shifted, suddenly aware of how near they were. Of how quiet the room had become. The laughter from moments ago felt distant now, like something that belonged to another version of them.
Her smile faded—not entirely, but enough to make room for honesty.
"This is... different," she said softly, more to herself than to him. Her fingers traced an idle line along the edge of a card. "We don't usually sit like this. Talk like this."
Ethan didn't respond, but he didn't look away either.
She inhaled, then let the question rise—the one that had been circling her thoughts since the lights went out.
The silence stretched, warm and charged, until—
A small, traitorous sound broke it.
A quiet growl.
Ethan blinked.
Scarlett froze.
For half a second, neither of them moved. Then realization hit her, and color rushed to her cheeks. "Oh my God," she muttered, pressing a hand to her stomach. "Ignore that."
The corner of Ethan's mouth twitched. "Was that your stomach?"
"No," she said quickly. "That was—" She stopped, sighed, defeated. "Yes."
Amusement flickered in his eyes, softening the intensity that had settled there moments ago. He rose to his feet, offering her a hand. "Come on."
"Where?"
"The kitchen," he said. "Unless you plan on starving dramatically in the candlelight."
She rolled her eyes but took his hand.
The kitchen was dim, lit only by the glow of a few candles he carried in and set along the counter. Shadows moved across stainless steel and marble, turning the sleek space into something quieter, more lived-in.
Ethan opened the fridge, peering inside with a faint frown. "Any preferences?"
"Food," she said. "I'm not picky when I'm hungry."
He scoffed softly but pulled out leftovers anyway, moving with easy familiarity as he reheated them. Scarlett leaned against the counter, watching him—how effortlessly he filled the space, how natural he looked in a place meant for ordinary moments.
They ate standing close, sharing the quiet, forks clinking softly against plates.
It felt... domestic.
Unsettlingly so.
When they finished, neither rushed to move away.
Scarlett exhaled, the tension easing from her shoulders, and something thoughtful crept into her expression. The warmth of the moment lingered—soft, intimate, dangerous.
Neither of them spoke.
Ethan set the empty plates aside and extinguished the extra candle, leaving only the ones in the living room burning. Without discussion, they drifted back the way they'd come, footsteps quiet, movements unhurried, as if neither wanted to be the first to break whatever spell had settled over them.
Scarlett lowered herself onto the floor first, returning to the same spot as before, legs folding beneath her with familiar ease. The indentation from earlier was still there, faint but telling—evidence that they'd already shared this space once tonight.
Ethan followed a moment later, sitting beside her instead of across from her this time. Close enough that their shoulders nearly touched. Close enough to feel the warmth of her body through the thin barrier of fabric.
The candles flickered between them, casting the same golden light, restoring the fragile bubble they'd left behind in the kitchen. It felt like picking up a conversation mid-breath.
Scarlett glanced at him, then looked away again, gathering her thoughts.
And then, softly—
"Do you ever think about our marriage?" she whispered.