Six Years of Silence

Chapter 2: Six Years of Silence

Six years.

Seventy-two months.

Over two thousand nights alone in a bed too large for one.

Rose had learned early that the silence in the Moretti household was not peaceful—it was calculated. Measured. Designed to remind her of her place.

She was the wife.

But not the woman in Damian Moretti’s life.

That role belonged to Elena Ferraro.

Rose had only met her once—four months into the marriage. She was coming down the grand staircase when she saw a tall, stunning brunette step out of Damian’s study, adjusting her lipstick in the hallway mirror.

Her dress had been wrinkled. Her hair mussed.

And her smile? Victorious.

They had locked eyes for only a second. Long enough for Rose to understand everything. Damian hadn’t even bothered hiding her.

He didn’t need to. What was she going to do? Walk away?

Rose never confronted him. She didn't cry or scream.

No—she went cold.

It was safer that way.

She learned to live among shadows. She spent her days painting, reading, or wandering the estate’s many rooms like a ghost. The staff pitied her in silence. Damian saw her less and less.

When they did speak, it was brief.

“You’ll be at the gala tonight,” he’d said once, not even looking up from his papers.

“I wasn’t invited,” she replied flatly.

“You don’t need to be. You’re my wife.”

A title, nothing more.

He gave her credit cards and a wardrobe filled with designer gowns, but never a conversation. Never a touch. Not even a kiss.

Yet whenever she stayed out too long…

Whenever she spoke to another man just a little too kindly…

He noticed.

Oh, he always noticed.

One night, a year into the marriage, she caught a glimpse of them—Damian and Elena—outside the wine cellar. He had her pinned against the wall, his mouth on her throat, hands greedy and rough.

Rose didn’t make a sound. She just watched.

Her heart didn’t break.

It calcified.

But the worst part wasn't Damian's affair.

It was the fact that she still felt something for him.

She hated herself for it.

Even in his cruelty, his control, his coldness—he haunted her. The rare times he touched her hand in public, the way he stood too close, the heat of his gaze across the dinner table—those small moments were enough to make her body ache, even if her soul screamed.

He was magnetic.

Dangerous.

And utterly indifferent to the damage he left in his wake.

Now, six years later, Rose stood before the mirror once again—only this time, she wasn’t wearing a wedding gown.

She wore black slacks, a tailored blouse, and a look in her eyes Damian had never seen before.

Resolve.

The divorce papers lay in her handbag. Her lawyer was waiting. She would hand them to Damian today.

She would end this gilded nightmare.

And maybe, just maybe, she’d begin to remember who she was before she became a ghost.

End of Chapter 2

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