Chapter 45 – A Deal with the Devil
****Isabelle’s POV****
The silence in the room was deafening.
It pressed against Isabelle’s skin like a second layer of suffocating air, thick with dread and impending doom. The overhead chandelier swayed slightly, casting elongated shadows across the ivory walls of the suite Luca had gifted her—or imprisoned her in.
She had stopped looking at the gilded mirrors. Her reflection had become a stranger, a ghost of the girl she used to be. In place of defiance, there was fatigue. In place of hope, a trembling sort of quiet rage.
She stood by the window, arms folded tightly across her chest, watching the rain soak the courtyard below. The rhythmic tapping against the glass didn’t soothe her—it sounded like ticking. Like time counting down.
Then came the
