Chapter 6 #2
I was in that hospital room again. The one that had nearly become my grave.
The sterile scent of antiseptic. The steady, mechanical rhythm of monitors that once convinced me everything would be alright.
I had been nine months pregnant. Almost there. I remember lying in the dark, my hands resting on my belly, searching for movement that never came.
I used to talk to her anyway—softly, desperately—describing a world I could not see: sunlight warming skin, laughter echoing through open spaces, music that could make even pain feel distant.
I had promised her life. I had promised her love.
Then came the pain—sudden, tearing, merciless—followed by blood that wouldn’t stop and a silence that swallowed everything.
Intrauterine fetal demise.
I remember screaming until there was nothing left of my voice. I remember reaching for anything solid enough to hold me together while everything inside me broke apart.
They said it was rare. As if that word could soften it.
And now... the child I had believed was life giving me a second chance had been taken from me too.
Zara was being taken in a different way, but it felt the same. Like history repeating itself with a cruel sense of humor I had never agreed to participate in.
Another child. Another light.
Another piece of me being removed as though I were not already fractured beyond repair.
A hot tear slipped down my cheek before I could stop it.
I wiped it away sharply, anger tightening my jaw, but it didn’t matter.
Another followed. Then another.
I hated crying. Hated how it betrayed me.
My shoulders trembled anyway.
I leaned forward, forehead pressing against the cool surface of the desk. It smelled faintly of polish and wealth and Rafael’s world.
“My Tess” I whispered, voice breaking despite myself. “My Tess has been taken from me...”
The words cracked at the end.
I reached blindly toward the computer, fingers shaking until I found the key that activated the read-aloud function. The machine clicked, then came alive with its sterile, artificial calm.
“Upcoming schedule: executive briefing at ten—”
I barely heard it.
“...budget review at eleven-thirty—”
Nothing.
All I could hear was her absence, and the memories we had built together.
Zara laughing as she tried to guide my hands to her drawings, insisting I “look properly” even though I couldn’t.
Zara curling into my side at night like she belonged there more than anywhere else in the world.
Zara’s small voice asking questions no one else bothered to answer with patience.
And Zara’s silence now.
I exhaled shakily.
I was still trapped inside the wreckage of Zara being taken when the atmosphere in the office shifted again.
Footsteps.
Unhurried. Loud enough to announce arrogance before the person even spoke.
“Well, well... look who got promoted.”
The voice was sharp with amusement, familiar in the worst way.
Bruno.
My fingers tightened almost instinctively on the edge of the desk.
I lifted my head anyway, forcing my expression into stillness.
Blindness made people assume softness. I had learned the opposite.
Stillness was control. Stillness was armour.
Inside, I was still shaking.
Bruno pulled out the visitor chair with exaggerated laziness and dropped into it like he owned the air in the room.
The chair creaked under his weight.
“Let me be very clear,” he went on, voice dropping into something almost conversational. “Being my brother’s personal assistant changes nothing. If anything, it only ensures I’m going to make your life a living hell.”
A pause.
Then a slow, amused exhale.
“Actually... the more I think about that irritating streak of defiance in you, the more entertaining this is going to be. I will most definitely enjoy torturing you.”
My jaw tightened.
I forced my voice to remain even. “I have work to do, Mr. Bruno.”
That made him laugh.
“Oh, listen to that,” he mocked. “So formal. So professional.” A pause, then I heard him lean forward slightly.
“Already settling into your position, huh? I don’t care what work you have to do or how overwhelmed you are. This is my brother’s company, and you’d do well to remember your place. When I speak, you listen.”
I ignored him. It seemed like the smartest thing to do when dealing with a man this arrogant.
Bruno laughed again.
“Why are you this stubborn?” he mused. “You’d think a blind woman would be easier to impress. Then again, maybe you just can’t appreciate how ridiculously good-looking I am.”
“If only you could see this face,” he drawled. “You’d be on your knees worshipping me. Hell, you’d be begging for far more than a slap on that ass.”
The words slid across the air like something dirty left too long in the sun.
I exhaled slowly through my nose.
“Perhaps no one has informed you yet,” I said calmly, “but I’m marrying your brother tomorrow.”
The silence that followed was immediate.
Even Bruno didn’t speak for a few seconds, and that alone told me the words had landed somewhere unexpected.
Then—
He laughed.
At first, it was disbelief. Sharp, quick bursts.
Then it grew louder.
“You?” he said between laughs. “Marry Rafael?”
Another laugh—shorter this time.
“A pathetic, blind nobody like you?” His voice rose with each word. “That’s the funniest thing I’ve heard all week. Rafael wouldn’t marry someone like you if you were the last woman on earth.”
I felt the shift before I heard it—the air tightening, the space changing density. Even Bruno noticed. I heard his posture adjust slightly, the way arrogance straightens when it senses a superior presence entering.
Heavy footsteps approached, measured and unhurried, yet somehow commanding every ounce of attention in the room.
Then came the scent of dark cedarwood and leather.
Rafael.
“What are you doing with my new personal assistant?” Rafael asked.
Bruno started to say something, but Rafael cut him off.
“Don’t bother. The look on your face tells me everything I need to know.” His voice turned cold. “Leave. And from this day forward, don’t set foot on this floor unless I specifically permit it.”
Bruno shot to his feet so abruptly that the chair scraped violently across the floor.
“You can't be serious.” he snapped. “Your office is on this floor. Are you saying I can’t come to my own brother’s office because of some bitch?”
A tense silence followed.
“And please tell me she’s bluffing,” he continued, disbelief sharpening his voice. “She said she’s marrying you.”
What happened next was so sudden I barely registered it.
A sharp movement.
Then Bruno gasped.
I didn’t need my eyes to know Rafael had his hand around Bruno’s throat.
The scent of cedarwood swept past me, followed by a loud thud that shook the room.
Bruno grunted in pain.
Rafael had slammed him into the wall.
“Loretta will be my wife,” Rafael said, his voice terrifyingly calm. “She will be a member of this family. Your sister-in-law.”
Bruno made a strangled sound.
“You will treat her with respect. In your words. In your actions.”
His grip seemed to tighten because Bruno’s breathing turned ragged.
“Insult her again,” Rafael said softly, “and you’ll learn exactly how expensive that mistake can be.”
The room fell silent.
The words lingered heavily in the air, pressing into the space like something solid.
Then I heard Bruno gasp—sharp, uneven breaths, the sound of someone suddenly allowed to live again.
Rafael had let him go.
I sat there, still trying to make sense of what I had just heard. Of what Rafael had just done. I wasn’t even his wife yet... and still, he had put his brother in his place because of me.
It unsettled me more than I wanted to admit.
“The family will never approve of this. Unless you plan to keep it hidden. But I know you, Rafael—you’ll never allow something like this to stay a secret.”
A bitter pause.
“Why would you even want to marry a fat, blind woman?” he snapped suddenly. “What will the clan say? What is the reason? What are you even thinking? Didn’t you swear off marriage after Zara died?”
His words came fast now, poisoned with disbelief, like the idea itself offended him.
Fat.
Blind, I was used to hearing. It was a word people threw at me like it defined my entire existence. But fat—
My stomach tightened before I could stop it.
I had always known where my weight settled. Not enough to be obvious, but enough that I noticed.
The softness at places I wished were different. The way clothes sometimes clung instead of falling the way I wanted them to.
I wondered, suddenly and unwelcome, if Rafael had noticed too.
If he saw it when he looked at me.
The thought settled in my chest like a quiet, humiliating ache.
My face stayed composed, angled toward the sound of their voices even though I couldn’t see either of them.
“Neither I nor Ramiro will disclose the marriage to the public,” Rafael said.
His voice came closer now. “And neither will you.”
A pause.
“I know you’re reckless, but your loyalty still belongs to this family. Correct?”
Bruno didn’t answer immediately.
I could hear him hesitate—anger fighting something older underneath it. Something like obedience.
Rafael continued anyway.
“Nothing will change my mind. I don’t need your approval or anyone else’s in the family. She will be my wife.”
The finality in those words was structural.
Like a lock clicking shut.
“I won’t let this wedding happen,” Bruno said suddenly, voice rougher now. Less controlled. “You’re blinded by whatever delusion this is.”
“I’ve been covering your failures because I gave our mother my word on her last day,” Rafael said. His tone had turned to steel. “Without me, you are nothing, Bruno. Don’t mistake my patience—or my silence—for love.”
A pause. Then colder still—
“If you refuse to know your place, I will put you there. Let this be the last time you threaten me.”
The air in the room tightened.
“Just because my hands are bound by promises doesn’t mean I don’t have other ways to make you bleed.”
A beat.
“Now leave.”
Silence followed.
Then movement.
Heavy, uneven footsteps—Bruno pacing once, then twice, like he was fighting the urge to say something else.
I heard the way he moved—angry, restrained, humiliated.
Then the door opened.
A brief pause.
And it closed behind him with too much force, the sound echoing through the office like an insult he couldn’t undo.
Then I heard Rafael’s footsteps approaching.
Every step made my spine tighten further, my senses sharpening in the way they always did when something unpredictable came too close.
I didn’t move. Couldn’t afford to.
I felt the air shift slightly as he leaned in or simply stood near enough to change it.
My fingers curled against the wood.
“Where is Zara?” I asked quickly, my voice tight, controlled only by effort. “Is she—”
“You’re free to go home early today. Prepare for tomorrow’s wedding. Ramiro will pick you up in the morning.”
He said it like he couldn’t wait for it to be sealed—like there was something behind it he was trying, and failing, to hide.
“Mr. Rafael,” I called quickly, my voice rising despite myself. “What if I don’t want the marriage anymore? What if I change my mind?”
“You won’t.”
The certainty in his voice was absolute.
“You will be my wife. Nothing—no demon, not even you—can change that.”
A brief pause followed.
I felt it more than I heard it, like his attention was still on me even as he turned away.
Then his footsteps shifted.
And his office door clicked shut behind him.
The sound carried farther than it should have.
And just like that—
he was gone.
I stayed completely still.
Blind eyes fixed on nothing, though it felt like I was staring directly into something vast and collapsing.
The silence after him wasn’t peaceful.
It was dense.
Like the room itself was holding its breath.
My hands slowly loosened from the edge of the desk, only to realize I had been gripping it so tightly my fingers ached.
I exhaled shakily.
My mind replayed his words again and again, refusing to settle into anything coherent.
You will be my wife. Nothing—no demon, not even you—can change that.
My stomach twisted.
It wasn’t that I couldn’t try to escape—it was that, for Zara, I would endure anything.
Even if it meant facing whatever Rafael Pérez had planned for me after the rings were exchanged tomorrow.