Isabella sat in front of the mirror, unmoving.
The room was silent except for the distant ticking of the clock and the sound of her own shallow breaths. Her wedding dress, expensive, custom-made, hand-delivered, felt like a costume she'd been forced into. The delicate lace clung to her skin. Pearls dripped from the bodice and neckline like a cage of wealth. The veil floated down her back, translucent and soft, but it weighed on her like something heavy and final.
She looked at herself, but the girl staring back didn't look real, eyes too wide lips pressed too tight and shoulders are too stiff. Trapped.
There was no music, no laughter, no celebration. Just silence. Heavy, cold, and suffocating.
Then…. The door creaked open, she didn't turn, she didn't need to.
She felt him enter, the air thickened and every heartbeat warning her
Rafael Knight.
He didn't need to speak to be heard, his presence was calculated, intimidating, and calm. The kind of calm that warned you before the storm.
She could hear the sound of his slow, deliberate footsteps as he walked across the room. Unhurried, controlled and certain.
He always moved like that like a man who had already decided how the story would end.
"You look beautiful," he said, low even it should've been a compliment. But it wasn't.
There was no warmth in his words. Just ownership.
Isabella's fingers curled around the edge of the vanity table "You can drop the act, Rafael.
We both know what this is." Her tone was calm, brittle, too sharp for words, her eyes shaking "I need to stay calm, I can't give him the satisfaction of fear"
Silence stretched behind her.
Then she felt him, a hand on her shoulder. Heavy, Firm and Possessive.
She turned slowly, meeting his gaze Icy, unblinking he didn't flinch hurt staring at her and he was too close for her liking
"This isn't a real marriage," she said quietly looking somewhere else Rafael's mouth tilted, but it wasn't a smile. "Oh, it is."
He reached out, brushing her jaw with his fingers cold, intensional like a warning, his touch wasn't gentle "You'll learn that soon enough."
Her heart skipped… The room shrank, colder and smaller and he hadn't even raised his voice
Rafael stepped back just enough for her to breathe, not enough to feel safe. He memorized her for a moment longer, like he was taking inventory of something already his
Then he turned and walked toward the door she didn't move, she couldn't.
He stopped at the door without looking back. "You're mine now, Isabella. You gave up the right to walk away."
The door clicked shut behind him and just like that, he was gone… She exhaled shakily.
Her reflection was still there, watching her, but now, she looked even less like herself, her heart want to jump out but she thought she can't let him win, not now.
She had made a deal with the devil….
And the ceremony was just….the beginning.