Maya regretted agreeing the moment she stood in front of the iron gates.
They loomed tall and imposing, guarding the vast estate beyond. The kind of place that screamed untouchable wealth and dangerous secrets. She clutched her satchel nervously, her palms damp.
"This is insane," she muttered to herself.
She should've said no. Should've walked away. But instead, she had let Adrian Vale convince her — with his sharp words and storm-gray eyes — to step into a world that had nothing to do with hers anymore.
The gates creaked open as if they had been expecting her. A man in a pressed suit greeted her with a polite bow.
"Miss Cole, Mr. Vale is expecting you."
The certainty in his tone rattled her. She wasn't ready for this. Not ready to face the man who had looked at her like she was still a musician, when all she felt was broken silence.
Still, she followed him up the long driveway, her boots crunching against the gravel. The mansion came into view — grand yet oddly cold, its tall windows reflecting the gray sky above.
Inside, everything gleamed. Marble floors, crystal chandeliers, walls lined with shelves of untouched books. It was beautiful, yes, but sterile. A house that looked lived in only by ghosts.
The butler led her to a set of double doors. He pushed them open with quiet reverence.
The music room.
Maya froze.
It was enormous, with ceilings that seemed to stretch into infinity. A grand piano stood at its heart, gleaming black beneath the soft light. The air smelled faintly of polish and old wood.
And there he was.
Adrian Vale.
He sat at the piano, one hand poised above the keys, though he wasn't playing. His head tilted slightly, as if listening to a sound only he could hear.
When his eyes lifted to hers, she felt that same strange pull — sharp and consuming.
"You came," he said simply.
Maya's throat tightened. "One month," she reminded him, her voice more defensive than she intended.
A flicker of amusement passed over his face. "One month," he agreed.
He stood and gestured toward the piano. "Sit."
Her stomach twisted. "You want me to play?"
"I didn't invite you here for tea," Adrian said dryly, though his tone lacked cruelty.
Maya's legs felt heavy as she approached. She hadn't played in a room like this in years. The silence pressed in around her, thick and suffocating.
She sat slowly, her hands hovering above the keys. Her reflection stared back at her in the polished surface — pale, nervous, unsure.
Adrian stood behind her, his presence sharp and inescapable. "Play whatever you want," he murmured.
Her breath hitched.
She pressed a key. The vibration buzzed faintly through her fingertip. Another. Then another.
A melody began, halting and uneven. Chopin's Nocturne, though broken in places. She hadn't practiced it in years. Her body remembered what her ears could not.
The silence inside her remained, but the vibrations painted a shadow of sound. It was enough to guide her. Enough to bring the memory of music back to life.
Her hands trembled, but they didn't stop.
And Adrian listened.
His eyes closed, his chest rising and falling with each note she conjured from silence. To him, it wasn't broken. It was raw. Honest. A reminder of what music was meant to be before perfection stripped it of soul.
When she finally stopped, her hands fell limply into her lap. Her chest heaved, her throat tight.
Adrian's voice was quiet, but steady. "Again."
Maya's head snapped toward him. "What?"
"Again," he repeated. "But this time, don't think. Just feel."
Anger flared in her chest. "Easy for you to say. You don't know what it's like—"
"I know exactly what it's like," he cut in sharply.
The sudden bite in his tone silenced her. His gray eyes burned with something unspoken — grief, rage, guilt. For a moment, he wasn't the controlled, untouchable man he pretended to be. He was raw too.
Maya swallowed hard, unable to tear her gaze away.
He stepped closer, his voice low. "Play again, Maya. Not for me. For yourself."
Her pulse thundered.
She turned back to the keys, her breath uneven. Slowly, she began again. This time, she stopped caring about precision. She let her hands stumble, falter, rise again. The music that emerged was imperfect, but alive.
Tears burned her eyes.
When she finished, silence filled the room again. But it wasn't empty. It was heavy, charged.
Adrian's gaze softened, almost unbearably so. "That's it," he murmured. "That's what I've been searching for."
Maya's chest tightened. She wanted to deny it, to push him away, but a dangerous truth settled inside her.
For the first time in years, she felt alive at the piano.
Later that night, as she left the mansion, Adrian watched her go from the tall window.
His hands clenched behind his back.
Maya Cole. The girl whose music had brought him back from silence.
And the girl whose life had been shattered the same night as his.
He had promised himself he would never let her know. Never let her discover his role in the accident that had taken her hearing.
But as he watched her disappear into the night, Adrian felt the weight of that secret press harder than ever.
Because sooner or later, silence always breaks.
[End of Chapter 5]