The drive back from the Vance Manor was conducted in a silence so heavy it felt like a physical weight pressing against Evelyn's chest. The interior of the Rolls-Royce was a cocoon of leather and shadows, the only sound the low, rhythmic hum of the engine and the muffled splash of rain against the tinted windows.
Silas sat beside her, his silhouette sharp against the passing streetlights. He wasn't leaning back like a tired man; he was sitting upright, his presence filling the small space with a suffocating, predatory energy. He didn't look at her, but Evelyn could feel his gaze—a cold, calculating heat that seemed to track the very beat of her pulse. Her lips still burned from the kiss in the garden, a bruised reminder that the man she had married was far more dangerous than the rumors suggested.
Marcus stopped the car at the main entrance of the estate. The transition was seamless. As the door opened, Silas moved back into his wheelchair with a practiced, fluid deception that made Evelyn's skin crawl. To the world, he was the broken heir. To her, he was the monster who had just bared his teeth.
"To the study," Silas commanded, his voice a low vibration that brooked no argument. "And Marcus—no interruptions. Not from anyone."
The study, which Silas called his "Sanctum," was a room Evelyn had never been allowed to enter. It was a cavern of dark oak and obsidian marble, lit only by the dying embers of a fire and the soft glow of a dozen computer monitors that lined the far wall. The air here was different—it smelled of ozone, old parchment, and the same sharp, masculine scent that clung to Silas's skin.
Marcus closed the heavy double doors, and the click of the lock sounded like a guillotine.
Silas didn't wait for her to sit. He stood up from the wheelchair, the movement slow and deliberate, a display of raw power meant to intimidate. He tossed his tuxedo jacket onto a leather sofa and began to unbutton his waistcoat, his eyes never leaving hers.
"Start talking, 'V'," he said, the name sounding like a slur coming from his lips. "And don't bother lying. I've spent the last three years tracking the digital ghosts that move through the Nightwood servers. I knew someone was trying to bleed my father's shell companies dry. I just didn't expect the ghost to be the girl I bought to save my reputation."
Evelyn stood in the center of the room, her midnight velvet dress feeling like a costume she had outgrown. She didn't cower. Instead, she straightened her spine, her blue eyes meeting his with a defiance that surprised even her.
"If you knew, why did you let me stay?" she asked, her voice steady despite the hammer of her heart. "Why marry me? You could have turned me over to the authorities the moment I set foot in this house."
Silas took a step toward her, his gait slightly uneven but his presence overwhelming. He stopped just inches away, the heat from his body radiating through the thin fabric of her dress.
"Because I needed a distraction," Silas hissed, leaning down so his face was level with hers. "My board of directors thinks I'm a cripple who can't even sign a check without help. My rivals think I'm a wounded animal waiting to be finished off. Having a 'disgraced' wife like you gave them exactly what they expected—a man who had given up. It kept them occupied while I finished my own work."
He reached out, his thumb tracing the line of the Nightwood Star around her neck. "But Julian Vane... he's a wild card. If he knows who you are, he's a threat to my timeline. And I don't like threats, Evelyn. I eliminate them."
"I was never going to give him those files, Silas," Evelyn said, her breath hitching as his thumb moved to the sensitive skin of her throat. "I'm not working for him. I'm working for myself. My father... he didn't just sell me. He stole the patents my mother left for me. He used her legacy to build his empire. I'm not here to destroy the Nightwoods; I'm here to reclaim what belongs to me."
Silas's gaze softened for a fraction of a second, a flicker of something that might have been recognition. He let go of her throat and turned toward the wall of monitors.
"The audit reports you're looking for... the ones Julian mentioned. They aren't in my father's office," Silas said, his voice dropping into a professional chill. "My father was a fool, but he wasn't careless. He kept the originals in a physical vault, but the digital copies are buried behind a triple-encrypted layer on the Nightwood mainframe. A layer that even my best security teams haven't been able to penetrate without triggering a self-destruct sequence."
He looked back at her, a dark smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. "You're the ghost, Evelyn. You're 'V'. If you want those files—the files that prove your father was a co-conspirator in my father's illegal mining operations—then you're going to get them for me."
"You want to partner with me?" Evelyn asked, stunned. "After tonight? After Julian?"
"I don't partner with anyone," Silas corrected. "I employ them. You want your revenge, and I want to purge the filth my father left in this company. Our goals are aligned. For now."
He walked over to his desk—a massive slab of black granite—and tapped a key. A single image appeared on the largest monitor. It was a complex web of financial transactions, a map of the rot that lay at the heart of the Nightwood-Vance alliance.
"Consider this the fifty-third rule of this house," Silas said, his eyes glowing with a cold, intellectual fire. "You will work from this room. Under my supervision. Every keystroke you make, I see. Every file you open, I own. In exchange, I keep the authorities—and Julian Vane—off your back."
Evelyn looked at the screen, then at the man standing beside it. The dynamic had shifted. She was no longer just a contract wife or a victim; she was a co-conspirator. But as she moved toward the desk, her eyes caught something else.
On a small side table, tucked away between a stack of ledgers and an antique compass, sat a small, silver frame. It was out of place in this room of cold glass and high-tech weaponry.
Evelyn froze.
The woman in the photograph was young, her hair dark and her smile radiant, sitting on a park bench in a dress that looked like it belonged in a different era.
It was Evelyn's mother.
But it wasn't a family photo. It was a candid shot, taken from a distance, the kind of photo a man keeps of a woman he loved from afar—or a woman he was obsessed with.
"Silas," Evelyn whispered, her hand trembling as she reached for the frame. "Why... why do you have a picture of my mother in your private study?"
Silas didn't move. The air in the room seemed to vanish, replaced by a tension so sharp it felt like a blade. He didn't look at the photo. He looked at Evelyn, his expression becoming a void of cold, impenetrable stone.
"That," Silas said, his voice like the closing of a tomb, "is a part of the contract you haven't earned the right to read yet."
"She died ten years ago," Evelyn pushed, her voice rising. "My father said she died in an accident. But you have her picture... and you married me the moment I turned twenty-four. The exact age my mother was when she met my father. This isn't just about business, is it?"
Silas moved then, faster than she could react. He was across the room in two strides, his hand slamming down on the desk beside the photo, pinning Evelyn between his body and the granite. He leaned in, his eyes burning with a dark, ancient secret that made her blood turn to ice.
"Your mother wasn't just a victim, Evelyn. She was a genius who built the foundation for the technology every billionaire in this city now uses to hide their sins. And your father... your father didn't just kill her. He stole her mind."
He leaned even closer, his lips brushing against her temple. "You think you're here for revenge? You have no idea how deep the blood goes in this family. Now, sit down. We have a network to break, and a world to burn. And don't ever ask me about that photo again... unless you're prepared for the answer to destroy everything you think you know about your past."
Evelyn looked from the photo to Silas's cold, beautiful face. She realized then that the "Golden Cage" wasn't just about Silas protecting his secrets. It was about a war that had started before she was even born.
She took a seat at the desk, her fingers hovering over the keyboard. She was 'V'. She was a ghost. But as the first lines of code began to scroll across the screen, she knew she was no longer hunting alone.
The monster and the wildfire were finally in the same room. And the world was about to feel the heat.