Morning in the Harrington estate had always been muted, the kind of quiet dawn that felt orchestrated rather than natural—choreographed lighting, disciplined staff routines, a silence that moved with the precision of an empire built on wealth, fear, and excellence. But today, when Seraphina stepped into the corridor of the east wing, she felt something new in the air.
Something sharp.Something coiled.Something watching.
Her escorts—her disguised psychological security detail—had always been present, hovering a few feet behind her, maintaining just enough distance to let her pretend she was free. But today they moved closer.
Two steps behind her, instead of five.Hands nearer their concealed devices.Eyes more alert than usual.
It made the hairs on her arms rise.
She paused briefly near a side table filled with fresh flowers. Gardenias today—his mother's favorite. The scent was too sweet, too soft, too heavy. It settled on her tongue like guilt.
The head guard, disguised as a personal assistant, cleared her throat quietly.
"Mrs. Harrington, please proceed. We are following the morning schedule."
Morning schedule.
A schedule built around monitoring her sanity.
Seraphina resumed walking, but her thoughts spun wildly. Why are they closer today? Why are they acting like I might bolt or break or do something unpredictable?
Was she becoming worse?
Did she say something alarming last night?
Did her therapist report contain something she didn't remember saying?
She pressed her hand to her chest, feeling her pulse jump, uneven and nervous. The echo of last night's therapy session returned to her in fragments—her voice trembling, her knees drawn to her chest, the therapist quietly asking questions while scribbling down notes with a face too calm to be comforting.
Had she said too much?
No—she remembered clearly.
"He's a wounded creature."That sentence had slipped out before she realized she had said it aloud.
She winced now, teeth pressing into her lower lip.
Had that reached him?
Had someone told him she said that?
She didn't know much about the reports they gave him. Just that they existed, and that they were detailed, and that everything about her life—sleeping, eating, thoughts—went straight to him by dawn.
The thought made her stomach twist.
What if he read it?What if he resented it?
She couldn't decide which possibility terrified her more.
Her steps slowed. The bodyguards subtly adjusted their formation around her, as though anticipating she might faint.
"Why are you… closer today?" she whispered to the nearest one.
The guard didn't answer, expression unreadable.
"Is something wrong?"
"It is not our place to say, ma'am."
Ma'am.The word felt like a distant mockery of what she once thought marriage meant.
She swallowed hard.
She was encouraged—no, required—to walk through the garden every morning for her mental health. Usually she could pretend it was freedom. But today, with the guards practically breathing down her neck, the air felt claustrophobic, thick with unsaid things.
She tried to focus on the flowers—the roses, the trimmed hedges, the soft ripple of the fountain in the center garden. But her thoughts spiraled mercilessly toward the one person she wasn't allowed to approach without permission.
Adrian.
She hadn't seen him since two days ago at their scheduled meeting. He had answered her questions with the emotional temperature of a marble statue, and yet she had taken comfort in merely hearing his voice.
But now…now something felt different.
Her breath hitched.
Was he avoiding her even more than before?
As if on cue, the head guard spoke sharply into their comm.
"Chairman entering west corridor. All personnel stand by."
Chairman.
The word stabbed her with a strange mixture of dread and longing.
He was here.
She shouldn't care.
She did.
She always did.
Without thinking, she turned toward the corridor that connected east to west. The guards immediately closed ranks, blocking her path. Three steps backward. Two steps forward. An unmistakable wall of bodies.
Her heart sank.
"Is he—avoiding me?" Her voice cracked despite her attempt to keep it cool.
The guards exchanged the subtle, silent look of those trained not to answer questions without clearance.
"Please return to the garden, Mrs. Harrington," one finally said. "Your presence in the west wing is not permitted."
"Not permitted," she repeated softly.
She felt ridiculous.
She was his wife.Legally.Publicly.Photographed beside him on the morning they signed the papers.
But she had no right to stand in his wing.No right to see him without an appointment.No right to ask why her security had suddenly tightened.
Only one explanation lingered in her mind:
He knew.
He read the report.
And he didn't like what she had said.
Her steps stumbled. The world blurred slightly, the panic rising like static beneath her skin.
What if calling him "wounded" insulted him?What if calling him a "creature" humiliated him?What if her attempt to understand him only pushed him further away?
Her breathing hitched. She pressed her hand against the garden railing to steady herself.
She spoke without meaning to.
"He read it… didn't he?"
The guard blinked—but that momentary flicker of hesitation was an answer in itself.
Her knees weakened.
Of course he read it.Of course he did.
Every night he received detailed reports of her mental condition. He knew what she ate, what she said, what she feared. He had more information about her than she had ever willingly given anyone in her life.
Her face grew hot.
She felt exposed.Vulnerable.Stupid.
She turned toward the west wing again, as if she might catch even a glimpse of him walking through the hall.
But there was nothing.He must have taken another route.Avoided this corridor entirely.
Avoided her.
She closed her eyes tightly.
What had she done?
She had finally tried to understand him.She had finally voiced what she saw—what she felt—about him.
And now he was further away.
She had never intended to wound him with the truth.
She just hadn't realized how fragile the truth might be.
Her thoughts raced.
Did he hate being seen?Did he feel exposed like a cornered animal?Did naming his suffering make it worse for him?Did she violate something sacred, something he had locked away so deeply that not even sleep could touch it?
Her heart pounded painfully.
But the worst question bubbled up from the darkest part of her mind:
Was he tightening her security because he didn't want her near him anymore?
She looked down at her hands—small, shaking slightly. They looked delicate, foolish, empty.
She had wanted his attention so badly.She had wanted to understand him so desperately.
And he—
He wanted distance.
Her lungs constricted as the realization struck hardest:
She had not figured him out.Not even close.
She had only scratched the surface of a darkness too deep for her to comprehend.
Her words in the therapy room had been a guess. A whisper. A hesitant observation.
But for him—for Adrian—those words had burrowed into a place he refused to acknowledge even to himself.
She wasn't wrong.
But being right had consequences.
She opened her eyes as the guards subtly adjusted their positions once more—sharper than yesterday, closer than last night.
He was pushing her away with silence and security.
She understood the message.
She was a liability to herself.And now, to him.
She wasn't sure which hurt more.