The mattress felt less like a place of rest and more like a slab of cold iron beneath my back.
I lay in the quiet dark of my bedroom, my eyes wide and tracking the faint, moving shadows cast by the streetlights outside. Sleep was always like a stranger to me-a distant luxury meant for people whose minds weren't constantly running in endless, exhausting circles.
I stared up at the blank ceiling, feeling the familiar, heavy weight settling onto my chest. "Why?" The question repeated itself like a sickeningly familiar rhythm in my head. Why does this always have to happen to me?
It felt like the cruelest joke of my existence. single time I gathered the courage to take one tentative step forward; every single time I allowed myself to believe that maybe, just maybe, the ground beneath my feet was solid, the universe reached out and shoved me ten steps back into the mud. I was tired. So profoundly, bone-deep tired of fighting the same invisible battles, of picking up the shattered pieces of my own confidence only to watch them drop again. Progress was an illusion, a carrot dangled in front of my face just to keep me walking toward another cliff.
I shifted against the sheets, but no position offered comfort. My thoughts naturally drifted backward, retreating to the previous night, and a sudden, sharp ache bloomed in my chest; not of pain, but of a desperate, longing grief.
I remembered how I fell asleep in Rayn's arms.
It was terrifying how clearly my body recalled every detail. I remembered the rhythm of his chest rising and falling beneath my cheek, the solid, unyielding warmth of him, and the faint, grounding scent of cedar and cool rain that seemed to cling to his skin. It had been the most peaceful, comfortable sleep I had ever had in my life. For the first time in as long as I could remember, the dark hadn't felt suffocating. The merciless, clawing nightmares that usually dragged me under into breathless panics hadn't come for me. I felt safe. I felt secure, completely out of danger, as if his hold was an impenetrable fortress built just to keep me whole.
And now, lying alone in my own bed, the contrast was unbearable.
With a soft, frustrated sigh, I reached out and grabbed my phone from the nightstand. The stark, blue light flared in the darkness, forcing me to squint. Notifications were flooding my screen in an endless stream. I unlocked it and opened the group chat.
Ilya and Nami had completely spammed the thread like the craziest people on the planet. Page after page of frantic messages, typing in all caps, asking where I was, if I was okay, if I was safe, threatening to break down my front door if I didn't reply. They were genuinely, deeply tensed for me, their panic practically radiating through the glass. Under normal circumstances, their dramatic fussing would have brought a warm smile to my face. But tonight, I just wasn't ready to face them. I couldn't bear the thought of typing out answers or trying to explain the tangled knot inside my head.
I flipped the phone face down onto the mattress, letting the room plunge back into darkness, and went back to staring at the ceiling.
I couldn't help but think that it would be so much better if the night simply didn't exist.
Daytime was manageable. During the day, the noise covered up the quiet fears, and the sun forced me to move, to act, to pretend. But the night was a different monster entirely. My demons always come at night. The doubts, the memories, the quiet horrors I keep locked away during daylight hours always creep out of the dark the moment the lights go off. They sit on my chest, whisper in my ears, and remind me of every vulnerability I try to hide. I was so thoroughly exhausted from these awake nights, so sick of staring into the dark until my eyes burned, begging my mind to just shut off.
Eventually, the dark began to dilute into a pale, sickly gray as dawn approached. My eyelids grew impossibly heavy, weighed down by hours of useless agonizing, and I finally sank into a thin, fragile stupor.
My morning sleep was broken by what felt like a thousand bells of notifications tearing through the room.
It wasn't a soft alarm or a gentle nudge. It was an aggressive, relentless barrage of sound and vibration that shattered my light sleep into a million sharp pieces. My phone was buzzing frantically against the wood of my nightstand. A was repeatedly calling me, i looked at the screen *WIFEYYY* -Nami's nickname flashing across the blinding screen.
I groaned, burying my face into my pillow to drown out the noise, but the ringing wouldn't stop. Finally, with my head throbbing and my brain moving through thick mud, I reached out and swiped the screen to answer.
"Nami...?" I mumbled into the sheets, my voice raspy.
Before I could even finish asking what was wrong, Nami's voice exploded through the speaker so loudly I had to pull the phone away from my ear.
"BITCH! TURN ON THE TV RIGHT NOW!" she screamed, her voice cracking with sheer, unadulterated shock and panic. "SEE WHAT THE NEWS REPORTERS ARE SAYING ON TV! GET UP AND LOOK!"
I rubbed my eyes with the heel of my hand, completely confused. What could possibly happen in the early morning to make her react like this? "Waddahell, calm down, what are you talking about—"
"DO WHAT I AM SAYING, ARORA. JUST TURN IT ON! NOW!"
Confused, irritated, and feeling a sudden prickle of anxiety at her frantic tone, I swung my legs out of bed. The cold floor bit at my feet as I grabbed the remote off my dresser and clicked the power button on the TV.
The screen flickered to life, illuminating my dim room in harsh, flashing colors. The bright red banner at the bottom of the news channel read:
BREAKING NEWS: TRUTH BEHIND ALSRIO ORGANISATION EXPLOSION REVEALED.
My heart took a sudden, violent plunge into my stomach.
The news anchor on screen was speaking with urgent, breathy intensity, standing in front of archival footage of the massive corporate empire belonging to Ranyald Alsrio—Rayn—alongside fresh reports from federal authorities.
"We are now getting shocking new developments regarding the explosion that blasted the biggest business company, the Alsrio Organisation, month ago," the reporter announced, her voice filled with tension. "While the blast targeting Ranyald Alsrio's company was initially under investigation, authorities have now uncovered that Moritz Vernon Irwin and Eiran Vernon Irwin deliberately blasted the company in a calculated, planned attack."
I froze, my hand hovering over the remote, unable to process the bomb dropped on live television.
"Investigative reports confirmed today that following the blast month ago, Moritz flew and hid himself into the sharing of being caught up by the police as they raided the premises. While police arrested Eiran at the scene back then, authorities have been conducting an intense ongoing search for Moritz ever since..."
My mind was reeling, but the broadcast suddenly cut to a high-profile press conference on an international TV channel. A distinguished, powerful figure stood behind a podium covered in microphones.
"On this international TV channel, Altieri Vernon Irwin—the famous business dealing groups founder and Moritz's big brother—has just stepped forward," the news anchor reported. "He held a global broadcast, apologizing on behalf of his brother for the deeds of Moritz."
My fingers tightened around the remote until my knuckles turned white.
"The 'deeds' in question," the reporter continued, her tone turning grim and disgusted, "go far beyond the attack on Ranyald Alsrio's company month ago. The whole personality and mask of being a gentleman that Moritz maintained for years was violently ripped away by Ranyald Alsrio. Evidence brought to light and handed overby Ranyald Alsrio reveals how Moritz systematically played with different women—their emotions, their physical well-being, and their trust."
The screen shifted to show heavily censored documents and evidence files that Rayn had exposed to the public and authorities.
"The polished nobleman mask was totally shattered," the anchor said, her voice dropping into a horrified tremble. "Leaked investigative files confirm that Moritz systematically assaulted multiple women, leveraging his family's elite status and wealth to silence his victims. Most damning of all, medical examiner reports released today confirm that Moritz was responsible for the death of a young woman following severe, prolonged physical abuse; a crime previously concealed through coerced non-disclosure agreements and massive financial payouts. It was Ranyald Alsrio himself who brought these horrific atrocities to light, ensuring the evidence reached federal prosecutors. Unsurprisingly, this shocking revelation has dominated global headlines, sending shockwaves across the business and political world."
My eyes were practically out of my head. Shock hit me so hard that my knees felt weak, and the remote slipped from my numb fingers, thudding quietly onto the rug.
Moritz. The man who had acted so refined, so polite, so completely incapable of malice. He wasn't just a dishonest man targeting Rayn's empire, he was a monster in human skin. How worst could a person possibly be? He had looked into people's eyes with a gentle expression while hiding the soul of a sadistic murderer. He had raped women without an ounce of remorse and physically tortured a poor soul until her heart stopped beating. It made my blood run ice-cold. He was the absolute worst kind of evil, a cruel predator who used his fake gentleman persona to lure innocent victims into his living hell.
A desperate, overwhelming urge surged through me. I wanted to call or message Rayn right now. I needed to hear his voice, to know how he was doing after taking on the sheer weight of exposing such dark horrors to protect everyone... My thumbs flew over my phone screen, frantically opening my messaging app to search for him.
Then, I stopped dead.
I didn't have his number.
A cold wave of reality washed over me. I had never saved his contact. I could ask Ilya-she was his sister, she would obviously have her brother's number. My thumb hovered over Ilya's chat, but I hesitated. Seeking my friend just to ask for her brother's number right now... it would look so odd. In the middle of a massive national scandal involving the Vernons and the Alsrios, barging in to ask for Rayn's personal cell felt deeply wrong and desperate. I couldn't do it.
I slowly lowered the phone, my hands trembling violently.
I turned my gaze back to the television screen, staring at the headlines flashing across the broadcast. As the full reality of what Moritz had done settled into my mind, my eyes grew wet. A heavy, hot tear spilled over my lashes and trailed down my cheek.
Then another followed, blinding my vision.
I couldn't stop the tears from falling as I thought about what Moritz did with those other women. My chest throbbed with a deep, sickening pain as I pictured it—the sheer horror, the terrifying emotional torment, the brutal physical torture that killed an innocent woman, and the violation so many others endured for him. They had trusted his gentlemanly smile, completely oblivious to the demonic cruelty hiding behind it. How many lives had he broken beyond repair while walking around like a saint?
I pressed my palm over my mouth, a quiet, broken sob tearing from my throat. Standing alone in the flickering light of my TV, I wept for the woman who lost her life to his cruelty, horrified by how truly monstrous Moritz was, and overwhelmed by the sheer, terrifying weight of what Rayn had just pulled into the light.