The silence inside Will Bruce was the kind that pressed against your skin.
Heavy. Golden. Suffocating.
Lisa descended the sweeping staircase with slow, measured steps. The faint echo of her heels was swallowed by the vast emptiness of the marble hall. Everything gleamed, the polished banister, the cold perfection of the chandeliers, the tall mirrors that reflected her every uncertain movement.
To the outside world, Will Bruce was a palace. To her, it was a beautiful prison.
For a week now, she had lived here, a stranger in her own marriage, a name on a contract written in gold ink. Mrs. Will Bruce. The words still felt like a cruel joke. He was her husband on paper, her captor in truth.
And yet… there were moments. Fleeting, confusing moments when she didn't know whether to hate him or understand him. Moments when his silence spoke louder than his words.
Tonight was one of those nights.
⸻
She found him in the dining hall, seated at the far end of a long mahogany table that could have seated twenty. Only two places were set. The rest of the chairs stood empty, like ghosts of a family that never existed.
Will Bruce sat in his usual composed stillness, tie loosened, top buttons undone, the faintest hint of exhaustion in his features. The chandelier light softened him, gold reflections dancing across his sharp jaw and the smooth line of his throat.
For once, he didn't look like the ruthless businessman the world feared. He looked… almost reachable.
His eyes lifted to meet hers. Cold gray, unreadable as ever. But something flickered there , something human.
"You're late," he said. His voice was low, controlled, the kind that didn't need to rise to be obeyed.
Lisa swallowed, fighting the sudden dryness in her throat. "I didn't realize dinner had a schedule."
A pause. Then a faint tilt of his head. "Everything in this house has a schedule, Mrs. Bruce. You'll learn."
Her fingers curled against her palm. That name again. Mrs. Bruce. The way he said it slow, deliberate felt like a hand around her wrist, invisible but unbreakable.
She took her seat at the opposite end of the table, the space between them stretching like a chasm. Dinner was served in silence by the staff, their movements precise, wordless, mechanical. The smell of roasted herbs and fine wine filled the air, but Lisa's appetite was gone.
Each clink of silverware echoed in the stillness. She focused on her plate, on cutting neat, pointless pieces she couldn't bring herself to eat. Yet her eyes kept drifting — again and again — to him.
And each time, he was already looking.
⸻
She hated it — that steady, unwavering gaze. It was like he was studying her, memorizing the smallest shifts in her expression, the faintest tremor in her voice.
When she finally pushed her plate aside, unable to pretend anymore, he spoke.
"You've been avoiding me."
Her fork paused midair. "I'm not avoiding you."
"No?" His tone was mild, but the edge beneath it was sharp. "Then perhaps the walls have simply been hiding you for me."
Lisa set the fork down carefully, forcing her voice to stay steady. "I don't see the need to force conversation."
He leaned back in his chair, eyes gleaming faintly in the golden light. "You think if you stay out of my way, I'll forget you exist?"
Her chest tightened. "Wouldn't that make things easier for both of us?"
Something dangerous passed across his face — not anger, not quite. Something else. He rose from his seat, the soft scrape of his chair loud in the silence.
When he spoke again, his voice had dropped lower, darker. "You're my wife, Lisa. I don't forget what's mine."
Her breath caught.
Heat — sharp and unwelcome — crawled beneath her skin. She should have been furious. She should have stood up and reminded him that this marriage was nothing more than ink and circumstance.
But instead, she felt the pulse in her throat quicken, a traitorous flutter of something she refused to name.
"I'm not yours," she whispered. "This marriage isn't real. It's a deal. Nothing more."
He crossed the distance between them in two quiet strides. Suddenly, he was standing beside her chair, and she could feel him — his nearness, his warmth, the faint scent of rain and cedar that clung to him.
"Deals," he murmured, his hand lifting to tilt her chin upward. His touch was firm, his fingers warm against her skin. "Always come with consequences."
Her heart pounded so hard she could barely hear herself breathe. "And what consequence is this?"
His gaze dropped to her lips. "You tell me."
The air between them thickened, charged with something electric and unspoken. Her body felt suspended between fear and desire, both impossible to separate. She hated him for making her feel like this, for confusing her so completely.
His thumb brushed the corner of her mouth — a ghost of a touch, enough to send sparks skittering through her chest. She froze, every instinct screaming to move, to speak, to do something, but the world had gone quiet. The only sound was the uneven rhythm of their breaths.
"Will…" Her voice trembled despite her effort to sound strong.
He stilled, his expression flickering for the briefest moment, as if the sound of his name on her lips unsettled him. Then, just as quickly, the mask returned.
"You should rest," he said softly, stepping back. "Tomorrow will be another long day."
And with that, he turned away, reclaiming his seat as if nothing had happened. As if he hadn't just rewritten the air between them.
⸻
Lisa didn't move for a long time. She sat there, her pulse still racing, her thoughts a tangle of confusion. When she finally stood, her knees felt unsteady.
She should have felt victorious for standing her ground. Instead, she felt… hollow. Uncertain. As though he'd stolen something intangible, the space she'd built between them, the illusion of control.
On her way upstairs, she caught a glimpse of him again, this time through the reflection in the tall hallway mirror. He was still seated, glass in hand, staring at the space she'd just vacated. His expression was unreadable, but there was something in his eyes that didn't belong to the cold, ruthless man she'd met weeks ago.
Something almost… lonely.
⸻
Sleep refused to come.
Lisa lay awake, the moonlight spilling through the tall windows of her room. The house was silent but for the faint ticking of a clock somewhere down the hall. Every creak, every whisper of wind felt amplified in the stillness.
Her thoughts kept returning to him, to the way his fingers had brushed her skin, the way his gaze had softened for that one impossible second.
She pressed a hand against her chest, feeling the wild rhythm beneath her palm. "Stop it," she whispered to herself. "He's not… he's not that man."
And yet, another part of her — smaller, quieter, far more dangerous — whispered back: What if he is?
⸻
Unable to bear it anymore, she rose and wrapped a shawl around her shoulders. The house was dim and vast, every step echoing softly as she moved through the corridors.
She wasn't sure where she was going until she found herself before his study door.
The light was on.
Through the crack, she saw him, sitting by the window, still in his shirt from dinner, sleeves rolled up, the faint glow of his desk lamp tracing the strong lines of his forearms. Papers lay scattered before him, but his focus was elsewhere — out into the night, where rain had begun to fall against the glass.
Something in that sight — the solitude, the quiet ache of it — made her chest tighten.
She should have turned away. She should have gone back to her room and locked the door and forgotten this foolish impulse.
But she didn't.
⸻
She stepped inside softly. He didn't notice her at first.
"Can't sleep?" His voice broke the silence before she could speak, low and rough — as if he'd known she was there all along.
Lisa hesitated. "Neither can you."
He looked up then, eyes meeting hers — tired, shadowed, stripped of all the power she'd come to expect. "I'm not built for peace."
She offered a faint, almost sad smile. "I've noticed."
He huffed a quiet sound that might have been a laugh. Then he gestured to the seat across from him. "If you're going to haunt my halls, you might as well sit."
She did. For a while, neither of them spoke. The rain outside grew heavier, drumming softly against the windows.
It was strange — how silence between them could shift like this. At dinner, it had been a weapon. Here, it was a bridge.
"You built all this," she said finally, glancing around the room lined with books and portraits and quiet wealth. "The company, the empire, the name. Does it ever… feel like enough?"
He leaned back, considering her. "Enough for what?"
"To make you happy."
For the first time, he didn't answer immediately. His gaze drifted toward the window again. "Happiness is overrated," he said quietly. "Control lasts longer."
Lisa studied him, the tension between them softening into something fragile. "You don't always have to be in control, you know."
He met her eyes again, and something in his expression faltered. "If I let go," he said slowly, "I'm not sure who I'd be."
Her throat tightened. "Maybe that's not such a bad thing."
For a long moment, they simply looked at each other, the rain whispering secrets against the glass, the air between them humming with the weight of all they couldn't say.
Then, as if drawn by some unseen force, Will reached across the desk. His fingers brushed hers — a soft, unguarded touch that neither of them pulled away from.
It wasn't a kiss. It wasn't a confession.
But it was a beginning — fragile, dangerous, and real.
⸻
That night, as Lisa finally returned to her room, her hand still tingled where he had touched her. She didn't know what they were becoming — enemies, partners, or something far more complicated.
All she knew was that something had shifted.
And in the quiet storm of Will Bruce, two hearts that had sworn to stay cold were starting — helplessly, quietly — to thaw.