The Vexley mansion's sitting room had always looked like it belonged in a magazine—one of those impossibly perfect spreads where nothing was ever out of place and nobody had real problems. Plush cream armchairs sat primly beneath oil paintings of landscapes so peaceful they almost felt smug about it. Sunlight poured through the towering French windows, stretching long golden beams across the polished hardwood floors.
Normally, the room whispered comfort. Today, it practically shouted panic.
The air felt too thick, too still, as though even the dust particles had paused to watch the drama unfold.
Right in the center of it stood Eliana Bennett.
Frozen.
Not the delicate, fainting-heroine kind of frozen—but the dangerous kind. The kind where emotions stack up quietly until they're one sarcastic comment away from erupting.
