Living with Strangers
684 Words
The marriage took place quietly.
No press, no guests, no flowers. Just signatures inked on paper, overseen by lawyers and sealed with legal formality. The rings were plain platinum bands, symbolic and bloodless. The ceremony was conducted in a private chamber of a civil court—an event so clinical, it might have been a merger, not a union.
Which, Elena supposed, it was.
Matteo stood beside her, stoic in a tailored charcoal suit, his expression unreadable as always. He didn’t reach for her hand. She didn’t offer hers. When the officiant pronounced them legally bound, Matteo only gave her a slight nod—acknowledgment, not affection.
They left in separate cars.
---
The apartment Matteo provided was in a restored 17th-century palazzo tucked behind the Basilica di Sant’Eustorgio—discreet, breathtaking, and inconveniently close to his own Milan residence. Elena refused to move into his space, and he hadn’t pushed. Their compromise was neighboring worlds.
Elena stepped into her new home on a rainy Thursday evening, greeted by silence and the faint scent of expensive wood polish. It was larger than her penthouse, with hand-painted ceilings, marble fireplaces, and a terrace that overlooked a hidden courtyard lined with cypress trees.
It was beautiful.
It didn’t feel like hers.
She wandered the rooms, touching nothing, already calculating how long she could endure this arrangement. The staff had stocked the kitchen with her preferences. Her books had been transferred from her old apartment. Even her rare tea blend had been sourced and placed in a crystal jar on the counter.
Of course Matteo would orchestrate every detail like a strategist.
Of course he would try to make the cage look like a castle.
A soft knock at the door startled her.
She opened it to find Matteo standing there, no bodyguards, no coat despite the rain.
He looked tired. Or maybe that was just the light.
“You moved in,” he said.
“I signed a contract,” she replied. “I’m following it.”
There was a pause. His eyes, always so cold, flicked briefly to her stomach—just beginning to show beneath her silk blouse. Something unreadable passed over his face.
“May I come in?”
She hesitated, then stepped aside.
He walked in slowly, hands in his pockets, surveying the space with a faint nod. “I had them match the tones to your old apartment.”
“I noticed.”
Silence stretched between them like a drawn wire. Then Matteo turned to face her.
“I understand this isn’t ideal.”
Elena raised a brow. “That’s one word for it.”
“But we’re here now,” he said. “And I don’t intend to be a distant figure in my child’s life.”
“Then don’t be.” Her voice was low. “But don’t confuse cohabitation with connection.”
Something sharp flickered behind his eyes. “You think I want more than that?”
“I think you don’t know what you want,” she said coolly. “You act like this is just another negotiation. But this isn’t business, Matteo. This is a human life. One that started because—for one night—you let your guard down.”
He stiffened, as if her words had struck somewhere vulnerable.
“I don’t let my guard down,” he said.
“You did with me.”
Another silence. Thicker this time.
And then, in a voice that was quieter than she’d ever heard it: “That’s what terrifies me.”
Elena stared at him, stunned for a moment. But before she could answer, he turned toward the door.
“I’ll be next door if you need anything.”
“I won’t.”
He paused, just briefly.
“No,” he said. “I didn’t think you would.”
The door clicked shut behind him.
And Elena stood in the middle of her opulent cage, hand resting lightly on the small swell of her stomach, wondering not for the first time—
What had she just agreed to?
And could any of them survive it?
- Writer
