18
── ? ──
AURORA
The penthouse feels different without Evander in it.
Bigger, maybe. Or emptier. Like the space itself has been holding its breath waiting for him to return, and in his absence it's finally exhaling, settling into something that feels less like a throne room and more like just… a room.
I'm sitting on the leather couch where I've spent the past three days existing in a state of numb compliance, staring at the floor-to-ceiling windows that overlook the ice-glazed campus below.
The biting freeze following the storm hasn't let up.
If anything, it's gotten worse—the kind of relentless, stagnant cold that turns the world gray and makes everything feel heavy, oppressive, like the sky itself is pressing down on your shoulders.
Tristan Virelle is across from me, sitting in the armchair Evander usually occupies, a glass of bourbon in his hand that he hasn't touched in the twenty minutes since Evander left for his board meeting.
He's been watching me. Not obviously. Not in the predatory way Evander watches, cataloging every breath and micro-expression like he's compiling data for some psychological experiment.
Tristan's observation is different—clinical, detached, like he's looking at a problem he's trying to solve and hasn't quite figured out the solution yet.
The silence between us is thick. Uncomfortable. I should say something. Should ask when Evander's coming back or what I'm supposed to be doing or literally anything to break this tension.
But I don't have the energy.
Haven't had the energy for days.
Since I surrendered. Since I walked through that door in the freezing cold and got on my knees and accepted that I belong to him now. That fighting is pointless. That this is just… my life now.
I'm so tired.
Tired of being angry. Tired of fighting. Tired of waking up every morning with that sick, hollow feeling in my stomach that reminds me I'm trapped, that there's no way out, that I'm going to spend the next four years—maybe longer—under Evander Laurent's control.
So I've stopped fighting.
Stopped arguing. Stopped giving him those flashes of defiance he seems to crave. I just… do what I'm told. Eat when he tells me to eat. Sleep when he permits it. Exist in whatever space he designates for me.
It's easier this way. Simpler.
If I don't fight, I don't have to feel the crushing weight of losing every single battle.
Tristan finally speaks, breaking the silence that's been stretching between us like a physical thing.
"You know he's been watching you for over a year, right?"
I don't respond. Don't even look at him. Just keep staring out the window at the rain.
He continues anyway, his voice perfectly even, perfectly controlled. "He orchestrated everything. The job loss. The scholarship. Even the debt." A pause. "But he didn't do it to hurt you."
That makes me laugh. The sound is hollow, bitter, completely devoid of humor. "Right. He destroyed my family's life because he cares."
"He destroyed your family's life because he's terrified."
Now I do look at him. Turn my head slowly to meet those unreadable hazel eyes that always seem to be seeing more than they should.
"Terrified," I repeat flatly. "Evander Laurent. The Crown Prince. The most powerful student on this campus. Is terrified."
"Of losing control." Tristan leans back in his chair, finally taking a sip of his bourbon. "Of losing the things he decides matter. Of being vulnerable in any way that could hurt him."
I stare at him. "Why are you telling me this?"
"Because you're killing each other." He says it simply, matter-of-factly, like he's commenting on the weather. "He's destroying you to keep you close. You're destroying yourself trying to disappear. And it's going to end with both of you broken beyond repair if someone doesn't intervene."
"And you're intervening."
"I'm providing information." He swirls his bourbon, watching the amber liquid catch the light. "What you do with it is your choice."
I turn back to the window. "I don't care about his reasons. I don't care why he did this. It doesn't change anything."
"Doesn't it?" Tristan's voice is quiet now. Almost gentle. "Don't you want to know why the man who controls everything is so desperate to control you specifically?"
I don't answer. Because I do want to know. Have wanted to know since that first day in the courtyard when he stopped in front of me and said you don't flinch like it was the most interesting thing he'd ever seen.
But knowing won't change anything. Won't give me back my freedom. Won't undo the past three days of hollow compliance.
So what's the point?
Tristan sets his glass down on the side table with a soft click. "Do you know why he wears that cross necklace?"
The question catches me off guard. I've noticed the necklace, of course—a thin silver chain with a simple cross pendant that Evander never takes off. Not in the shower. Not when he sleeps. Not ever.
I've seen him touch it sometimes. Absently, unconsciously, his fingers finding it when he's thinking or stressed or angry. Like it's a talisman. Or a reminder.
"No," I admit quietly.
"His mother gave it to him when he was eight years old." Tristan's voice is clinical now. Detached. Like he's reciting facts from a case file. "Right after she made him watch his younger brother drown."
The words hit me like a physical blow. I turn to stare at him, my pulse suddenly loud in my ears.
"What?"
"Evander had a younger brother. Matthias. Six years old. They were at the Laurent family estate—massive property with an Olympic-sized pool. The mother decided that Evander needed to learn a lesson about emotional control. About not being weak."
Tristan's eyes are distant now, looking at something I can't see. "She told Evander to sit on the edge of the pool and watch. And then she pushed Matthias into the deep end."
I can't breathe. Can't process what I'm hearing.
"Matthias couldn't swim. He was six. He went under immediately.
" Tristan's voice doesn't change. Stays perfectly even, perfectly calm, like he's describing a business transaction.
"Evander tried to jump in. Tried to save him.
But the mother had security hold him back.
Made him sit there and watch his brother drown while she stood on the edge timing it with a stopwatch. "
My stomach turns. Bile rises in my throat.
"She pulled Matthias out at the last possible second.
Had the estate doctor revive him. And then she turned to Evander and told him that fear is weakness.
That attachment is weakness. That if he ever wanted to be strong enough to lead the Laurent empire, he needed to learn to control his emotions perfectly.
To never let anyone matter enough that losing them could break him. "
I'm shaking now. My hands clenched into fists so tight my nails are cutting into my palms.
"She gave him the cross necklace afterward. Told him it was a reminder. That faith is for the weak. That the only thing he could rely on was his own control."
Tristan picks up his glass again, takes another slow sip.
"Matthias died six months later. Different pool.
Different circumstances. But Evander was there.
Watched it happen. Froze because his aquaphobia was already so severe by then that he couldn't move, couldn't think, couldn't do anything except stand there while his brother drowned for real this time. "
The room is spinning. I press my hands against my thighs, trying to ground myself, trying to process this information.
"He blames himself," Tristan continues quietly.
"Thinks that if he'd been stronger, less afraid, he could have saved Matthias both times.
So he spent the next thirteen years building walls.
Building control. Making sure he would never freeze again.
Never be vulnerable again. Never care about anyone enough that losing them could destroy him. "
He looks at me now, his eyes sharp and focused. "And then he found you."
I swallow hard. "Me."
"A girl clawing her way toward survival.
A girl who refused to break no matter what the world threw at her.
A girl who stood in a courtyard with coffee on her shoes and didn't apologize, didn't back down, didn't show any fear at all.
" Tristan leans forward slightly. "He recognized something in you, Aurora.
Something that reminded him of what he used to be before his mother broke him. Before he learned to be afraid."
"So he decided to break me instead," I whisper.
"No." Tristan shakes his head. "He decided to keep you. To own you. To make sure that if he was going to care about someone—if he was going to let someone matter—it would be on his terms. Under his control. Where he could never lose you the way he lost Matthias."
I stare at him, trying to find words, trying to understand what this means.
"He doesn't lock you in this penthouse because he hates you, Aurora." Tristan's voice is soft now. Almost kind. "Deep water terrifies him. Losing you terrifies him more. He just doesn't know the difference."
The silence that follows is deafening.
Outside, the bitter wind continues its relentless assault on the windows. Each gust of air sounds different now. Heavier. More threatening.
Like the universe trying to drown us all.
I think about Evander. About the way he watches me. The way he controls every aspect of my life with that surgical, unyielding precision. The way he touches the cross necklace when he thinks I'm not looking.
The way he pulled me onto his lap and breathed me in like I was oxygen and he was suffocating.
I thought he was a monster. A psychopath with a god complex who got off on controlling people because he could.
But he's not.
He's a traumatized boy who watched his brother die twice. Who was taught by his own mother that love is weakness and attachment is dangerous. Who built an empire of control because it was the only way he knew how to survive.
Who saw me and recognized something—someone—worth keeping.