She can't hear?
1057 Words
"The knife was cold. His eyes were colder. I did not know which one would kill me first."
I did not sleep.
I lay on the bed and stared at the ceiling. The hours passed in silence—my silence, the only silence I had ever known. I felt the house vibrate around me. Footsteps in the hallway. Doors opening and closing. The hum of the air conditioning. The distant thrum of the city below.
At 3 AM, the door opened. I flinched and sat up in the bed.
Alessio stood there. He was not wearing a shirt. I could see the scars on his chest. The tattoos on his arms. The muscles beneath his skin. His gray eyes moved over me, slow and deliberate, and I felt them like a touch.
I pulled away from the bed. I wanted him to see it. I wanted him to know what kind of monster he was.
He saw.
I reached for the small notebook on my nightstand. My fingers wrapped around it. I scribbled fast.
"You should learn how to knock before entering a woman's room."
I turned the notebook around and showed him.
His eyes dropped to the words. He read them. His jaw tightened. His gaze lifted to mine. He did not respond. He just looked at me.
I flipped the notebook shut and placed it back on the nightstand.
He did not move. I did not move for a while. He stared at me as if checking if I had any plans of leaving or running away. His gaze held mine, unblinking, and something in the air between us shifted. Thickened.
Then he stepped into the room.
Very slowly, he approached the bedside. Each step deliberate. Each step closes the space between us. I curled my knees up to my chest, pressing them against myself like they were a wall. A shield. Something to keep him on the other side.
He did not stop.
He leaned in forward. His gaze narrowed. He was very close to me now. Close enough that I could feel the heat radiating off his bare skin. Close enough that I could smell him—cedar and smoke and something dark underneath. His breath ghosted across my forehead.
I had noticed this about him. He leans very close to people when he speaks. Or maybe it was just me. Maybe he only did it with me. I did not know. I could not tell. People did not talk to me like this usually. They did not come close. They did not lean in. They did not make me feel like I was the only thing in the room worth looking at.
It was confusing.
He spoke. I read his lips.
"You didn't hear me knock?"
His gaze was full of suspicion. Sharp. Cutting. Trying to find the c***k in my armor.
I gulped.
Oh. He knocked. And I did not hear it.
My heart slammed against my ribs. I reached for the notebook again. Scribbled.
"I must have been asleep."
I showed him.
His gaze dropped to the notebook. Then to my face. Then to my eyes. He was not convinced. I could see it in the set of his jaw. The way his lips pressed together. The way his gray eyes lingered on mine a moment too long.
He opened his mouth to speak.
"Don Romano—"
Enzo's voice came from the doorway.
Alessio pulled back. He straightened. The heat between us vanished. The tension snapped.
And only then did I breathe.
Then he closed the door. He left.
I did not know why he came. I did not know why he left. I did not know anything anymore.
I closed my eyes. I tried to sleep.
I could not.
---
The maid came at 7 AM.
She brought a dress. White. Not black. White like a real wedding. White like something pure.
I almost laughed.
"Don Romano said you are to wear this," she said. She looked at me when she spoke. I read her lips.
I typed: *Thank you.*
She left.
I held the dress. The fabric was soft. Expensive. It smelled like flowers. Like something a bride would wear on the happiest day of her life.
This was not the happiest day of my life.
This was the day I signed away the rest of it.
---
I put on the dress.
I looked in the mirror.
A stranger looked back.
She was pale. Too pale. Dark circles under her eyes. Bloodstains on her collar—I had tried to wash them out, but they would not come clean. Cracked lips. Hollow cheeks.
But the dress was beautiful. White. Flowing. It made her look like a bride.
She was not a bride.
She was a prisoner wearing a costume.
There was a knock at the door.
*"It is time,"* a guard said.
I picked up my tablet. I walked out of the room.
---
The wedding was in the same room where Alessio had given me the choice between marriage and death.
The same desk. The same chairs. The same windows look out over the city.
But now there was a priest. And there were witnesses. Alessio's men. Enzo. A few others I did not recognize.
No flowers. No music. No family. No friends.
Just a room full of killers and a bride who could not hear her own vows.
Alessio was standing by the window. He was wearing a black suit. His gray eyes were cold.
He turned when I walked in. He looked at me. His eyes moved over the white dress. The bloodstains on my collar. The dark circles under my eyes.
*"You look like you are going to a funeral."*
I typed: *I would have been at the funeral if I had not agreed to this.*
He read the screen. His eyes narrowed. Not because of the remark. Something else. Something I could not name.
He looked at my tablet. Then at my face. Then at my throat.
He did not ask why I typed instead of speaking. He did not ask why my voice was a broken whisper. He did not ask anything.
He just looked at me. Like he was trying to solve a puzzle he did not want to admit existed.
*"Let us get this over with,"* he said.
- Writer
