Chapter 12: The House That Burned
2039 Words
The old Voss estate looked like a place God had abandoned halfway through punishing it.
Black stone.
Broken windows.
Iron gates standing open like a mouth.
Moonlight spilled across the long driveway, touching the dead garden, the cracked fountain, the walls still scarred from the fire that had supposedly killed Adrian Voss.
And there, tied to the gate, was the strip of red silk.
The same red as the dress Cassian had sent me.
The same red as the room where my name had been written on a wall.
WELCOME HOME, FORBIDDEN TOY.
The words stared at me like they had been waiting.
My stomach turned.
Cassian stepped in front of me, blocking the message with his body as if hiding it could make it less real.
“Stay in the car.”
I laughed once.
Ugly.
Exhausted.
“No.”
His head turned slowly.
“Alina.”
“My mother might be inside.”
“And that is exactly why you should stay back.”
“No. That is exactly why I’m going in.”
Elias stepped beside us, phone in hand, face tight. “I’ve called backup. Seven minutes.”
“Too long,” Cassian said.
He was looking at the house now.
Not like a man returning to old property.
Like a man returning to a grave that had started breathing.
I looked at him.
“You grew up here?”
His jaw tightened.
“Yes.”
“With Adrian?”
A pause.
“Yes.”
The wind moved through the burnt trees.
Somewhere in the dark, metal creaked.
The sound made my skin prickle.
Cassian took a gun from inside his jacket. Elias did the same.
I stared at them.
“Do all rich men carry weapons?”
Elias glanced at me. “Only the well-informed ones.”
“This is not comforting.”
“It wasn’t meant to be.”
Cassian turned to him. “East side.”
Elias nodded and moved along the driveway, disappearing into the darkness near the broken garden wall.
Cassian faced me again.
“You stay behind me. You do not touch anything. You do not open doors. You do not answer voices. If I tell you to run, you run.”
“And if I tell you to stop ordering me?”
His eyes flashed.
“Then I ignore you until your mother is safe.”
That shut me up.
Not because I liked it.
Because he was right.
I hated when he was right.
We moved toward the house.
Every step felt wrong.
The driveway was cracked beneath my heels. The air smelled of damp stone, old ash, and something faintly sweet. Rotten flowers maybe. Or perfume.
At the front door, Cassian stopped.
His hand went to the wood.
For the first time, I saw his fingers hesitate.
Not from fear.
Memory.
I softened before I could stop myself.
“What happened here?”
His voice was quiet. “Everything.”
Then he pushed the door open.
The inside of the mansion was worse.
The grand foyer had once been beautiful. I could see it in the bones of the place: the sweeping staircase, the high ceiling, the marble floor stained but still shining where the moon hit it.
But the fire had eaten the luxury and left behind a corpse wearing diamonds.
Blackened walls.
Fallen chandelier.
Portraits half-burned in their frames.
A cold draft moved through the foyer, carrying the smell of smoke that should have faded years ago but hadn’t.
Cassian stepped inside first.
I followed.
My heart hammered against my ribs.
“Mom?” I called before he could stop me.
The sound of my voice bounced up the staircase and came back wrong.
Mom.
Mom.
Mom.
Cassian turned sharply. “Do not call out.”
“That is my mother.”
“And if someone else answers?”
I opened my mouth.
Nothing came out.
Because somewhere above us, a floorboard creaked.
Slow.
Deliberate.
Cassian raised his gun.
I stopped breathing.
“Isabelle Moreau!” he called, voice controlled and loud enough to carry. “If you can hear me, say something.”
Silence.
Then a sound.
Soft.
Muffled.
A woman crying.
My blood went cold.
“Mom.”
I moved before thinking.
Cassian caught my arm.
“Wait.”
I fought him. “Let me go.”
“Alina, listen.”
The crying came again.
From the left corridor.
Soft.
Weak.
Female.
It sounded like my mother.
Or maybe I needed it to.
Tears burned my eyes.
“Please,” I whispered.
Something in Cassian’s face shifted.
He hated this.
I could see it.
He hated being the thing between me and the sound of my mother.
But he did not let go.
“Behind me,” he said.
This time, I obeyed.
The corridor to the left was narrow and darker than the foyer. Old wallpaper peeled in strips.
Broken glass crunched under Cassian’s shoes. Family portraits lined the walls, some burned beyond recognition.
One stopped me.
Two boys stood with an older man.
Cassian.
Adrian.
Their father.
Even through the damage, I could see the difference.
Cassian stood stiffly, serious even as a child.
Adrian smiled.
Beautiful.
Bright.
Wrong.
His painted eyes seemed to follow me as we passed.
The crying grew louder.
At the end of the hall was a door.
Not red.
Black.
Cassian stopped in front of it.
His face had gone pale beneath the hard control.
“What is it?” I whispered.
He swallowed once.
“My father’s study.”
The crying came from inside.
My hand flew to my mouth.
Cassian reached for the handle.
Locked.
He stepped back and kicked the door once.
The old wood cracked.
Again.
It burst open.
I rushed in behind him.
Then froze.
The room was empty.
No mother.
No crying woman.
Only an old speaker sitting on the desk, playing the sound on a loop.
My knees weakened.
“No.”
Cassian crossed the room, grabbed the speaker, and smashed it against the wall.
The crying stopped.
The silence afterward was worse.
I stared at the broken device.
Hope drained out of me so fast I felt dizzy.
Cassian turned toward me. “Alina—” “Don’t.”
My voice broke.
“Don’t say my name like that.”
His jaw tightened.
Before he could answer, the desk lamp flickered on by itself.
I screamed.
Cassian spun, gun raised.
A computer monitor on the desk glowed to life.
One video file appeared.
The title read: FOR THE GIRL.
Cassian went still.
I stepped forward.
“Play it.”
“No.”
“Play it.”
His eyes flashed to mine.
Then he pressed the key.
The video opened.
My mother appeared on screen.
Alive.
Tied to a chair.
A cloth around her mouth.
My whole world stopped.
“Mom,” I whispered.
She was in a room I didn’t recognize, dimly lit, her eyes wide with fear. Someone stood behind her, out of frame, only black-gloved hands visible on her shoulders.
A distorted voice spoke.
“Good evening, Alina.”
My nails dug into my palms.
Cassian stood beside me, deadly silent.
The voice continued.
“Cassian brought you to the wrong house. But then, he always was predictable when frightened.”
Cassian’s hand tightened around the edge of the desk.
The video shifted.
A second camera angle showed a room with white walls.
Medical equipment.
A window covered in black paper.
My mother was not at the estate.
This was another trap.
The voice laughed softly.
“Do you see the problem with rich men, Alina? They build castles. They build cages. They build rooms to store their sins. But they always forget one thing.”
The camera zoomed closer to my mother’s terrified face.
“Women remember.”
My throat closed.
“Who are you?” I whispered, though the video could not answer.
It did.
As if it had expected me.
The gloved hands reached up and removed a mask from the edge of the frame.
A woman stepped into view.
Mara.
My heart stopped.
Her face was bruised.
Blood marked her temple.
But her eyes were clear now.
Cold.
Focused.
Not the terrified woman from the party.
Not the bleeding ghost under my window.
Something else.
Something much worse.
Cassian whispered, “Mara.”
She smiled into the camera.
“Hello, Cassian.”
The room tilted.
I grabbed the desk.
Cassian looked like he had been struck.
Mara leaned down beside my mother, gentle enough to be horrible.
“Don’t worry, Alina. Your mother is alive. For now.”
I lunged toward the screen like I could reach through it.
Cassian caught me around the waist.
“Let go!”
“It’s a recording.”
“I don’t care!”
I fought him, but his arms held me, firm and shaking with restraint.
Mara’s voice filled the study.
“Here is the truth he will not tell you. Celeste did not die because she ran from Cassian. She died because she trusted him to save her from his family.”
Cassian’s face twisted.
“No.”
Mara’s eyes lifted as if she heard him through the recording.
“The Voss men have always chosen beautiful poor girls for their games. His father chose them.
Adrian chose them. Cassian watched them. And when Celeste became inconvenient, she burned with this house.”
Cassian let go of me slowly.
I turned to him.
He was staring at the screen, horror written across his face.
“That’s not true,” he said.
But his voice had cracked.
Mara smiled.
“Ask him where he was the night Celeste died.”
The video ended.
The screen went black.
The study went silent.
I turned to Cassian.
My chest hurt so badly I could barely breathe.
“Where were you?”
He did not answer.
The silence was immediate.
Damning.
“Cassian.”
His eyes came to mine.
In them, I saw the thing I had been afraid of since the first night.
Not guilt.
Something worse.
A truth ugly enough to ruin whatever fragile trust had begun between us.
“I was here,” he said.
My stomach dropped.
“The night she died?”
“Yes.”
“With her?”
His jaw tightened.
“Yes.”
I stepped back.
He stepped forward.
“Alina, listen to me.”
“No.”
“She’s twisting it.”
“Then untwist it.”
He looked toward the dark window.
Then back at me.
“I tried to get Celeste out. Adrian was alive. He had her. My father was covering for him. There was a fight. The fire started. I got out.”
My voice came out hollow.
“And Celeste?”
Pain ripped across his face.
“I thought she was behind me.”
There it was.
The failure.
The wound.
The ghost.
For one second, I almost believed him.
Then I remembered my mother tied to a chair.
Mara’s hands on her shoulders.
Celeste’s crossed-out photo.
My name on the wall.
I shook my head. “You thought.”
His face crumpled for half a second before control dragged it back.
“Yes.”
A loud crash sounded from upstairs.
Both of us turned.
Then my mother’s voice came through the house.
Not from a speaker this time.
Real.
Faint.
“Alina!”
My heart exploded.
Cassian grabbed my arm.
“No.”
I ripped free.
“Mom!”
I ran for the stairs.
Cassian shouted behind me, but I did not stop.
I flew up the broken steps, one hand on the railing, dress torn, heart wild.
At the top, a door stood open.
Light spilled from inside.
My mother’s voice came again.
“Alina, help!”
I reached the doorway.
And stopped.
The room was empty.
Except for one thing.
A woman’s white dress hanging from the ceiling.
Burned at the hem.
Covered in blood.
Pinned to the fabric was a note.
Celeste wore white when he let her burn.
Behind me, the floorboard creaked.
I turned too late.
A hand came out of the darkness and pressed a cloth over my mouth.
This time, when I screamed, no sound came out.
- Writer
