Chapter 2
764 Words
Chapter Two – Collateral Damage
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The silence in the villa was deafening.
Ariana sat up slowly, silk sheets sliding down her bare back. The bed still smelled like him — musk, heat, and the faint scent of tobacco and bourbon. Her heart twisted at the memory of his mouth on her skin, his voice rough with desire, his hands trembling with restraint that finally gave way.
But the space beside her was empty.
Still warm.
She reached out anyway, just to feel the cold creeping in.
He’s gone.
Wrapping the sheet around herself, she padded into the hallway, barefoot on the marble floors. There was no one. No guards. No noise. Just the distant sound of ice clinking into glass.
She followed it.
Downstairs, in the dim light of Matteo’s private study, he stood with his back to her. Freshly dressed. Black shirt buttoned to the collar. Not a hair out of place.
Everything about him was sharp, cold, impenetrable.
And when he spoke, it wasn’t her Matteo.
It was the boss.
“You should get dressed. Enzo will drive you home.”
Ariana froze in the doorway. “That’s it?”
His grip tightened around the glass in his hand, but he didn’t turn. “There’s nothing else to say.”
“No?” she whispered. “Because last night, you couldn’t stop touching me.”
He exhaled slowly through his nose. Measured. Controlled. “I was drugged.”
“You knew who I was.”
Silence.
She stepped closer, defiant. “You wanted me.”
He finally turned. His eyes were ice. “It doesn’t matter.”
“Yes, it does,” she snapped, heart cracking open. “Don’t pretend it was just the drug. I saw it in your face. You’ve felt this for a long time.”
He looked at her, then, really looked — and there was pain in his eyes. Buried. Feral. Caged.
And then it was gone.
He downed the whiskey in one swallow.
“You’re my stepdaughter,” he said coldly. “And I’m not a man who forgets what lines mean.”
Her breath hitched. “You didn’t care about lines when you were inside me.”
His face went dark. “Don’t. Say. That.”
“Why?” she challenged. “Because it makes it real?”
His voice was a low growl now. “Because it makes me want to do it again.”
Her breath caught.
“And I can’t,” he continued, every word like broken glass in his throat. “You think I don’t want you? I dream about you, Ariana. I look at you and I can’t f*****g breathe. But I won’t drag you into my world just to ruin you.”
She stared at him, throat tight.
“I never asked you to protect me.”
“You don’t get it,” he snapped, stepping closer now, barely holding back. “Every enemy I’ve made would kill to hurt me through you. If anyone finds out what happened last night… you’re dead. And it’ll be my fault.”
Tears pricked her eyes, but she held his stare. “So you’d rather hurt me now?”
He looked away.
“I’d rather hate myself than bury you.”
Ariana’s lip trembled. “You already buried me, Matteo.”
He said nothing. Just turned away like it would undo everything.
She waited. For him to stop her. Say something. Anything.
But the silence swallowed her whole.
She left.
And only when the sound of her heels faded did Matteo finally let go.
His glass shattered in his hand.
He didn’t flinch.
He staggered back, jaw tight, chest rising and falling like he’d been stabbed. He sank into the leather chair behind his desk and pulled open the drawer where he kept his private burner phone — the one no one but him ever touched.
He unlocked it with shaky fingers.
Gallery.
Hidden album.
Ariana.
Photos he took when she wasn’t looking — blurry candids, quiet moments. Her laughing in the garden. Wearing one of his oversized shirts when she stole his coffee. Curled up asleep on the sofa during a thunderstorm. Smiling like she didn’t know she was his favorite sin.
He stared at them for a long time, jaw clenched, chest aching like a wound.
His thumb hovered over the screen like he wanted to delete them.
He didn’t.
Instead, he whispered her name like a prayer he wasn’t allowed to say out loud.
“Ariana…”
His eyes burned.
But he never cried.
He couldn’t afford to.
- Writer
