Total pages in book: 140
Estimated words: 127933 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 640(@200wpm)___ 512(@250wpm)___ 426(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 127933 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 640(@200wpm)___ 512(@250wpm)___ 426(@300wpm)
The sound of hurried footsteps echoed through the house, and then Jamison was there. He stepped into the room, his eyes immediately sweeping over the scene, taking it all in with an expression I couldn’t decipher.
Instead of going to Cassandra—his wife, his sister—he rushed to Emilia. I stepped back, nearly retreating into a corner as Jamison reached the bed. He dropped to his knees beside her, his hands gently cupping her tear-streaked face as she began apologizing, her sobs wracking her frail body.
"I'm sorry," Emilia wept, over and over, her voice breaking. "I'm so sorry."
"It's okay," Jamison murmured, his voice thick with emotion. "It's okay, Em. You're okay." Tears glistened in his own eyes as he leaned forward, pressing his forehead to hers, trying to offer her any comfort he could.
The sight of it made my stomach churn, not because of Jamison’s actions, but because of Cassandra. She lay on her bed, mirroring Emilia’s cries, mocking the woman’s anguish as if it belonged to her. The look on her face as she watched her husband comfort Emilia was something else entirely—it was pure hatred. It twisted something inside me.
I couldn’t stand to see it. Without thinking, I moved in front of Jamison and Emilia, blocking Cassandra’s view. For a split second, her hatred shifted to me, her eyes narrowing in rage. But then she remembered who I was. Her gaze dropped, and her lips pressed together in a tight line as if she didn’t dare show that hatred to me. My stomach churned violently, and I felt bile rising in my throat.
I needed to get out of the room.
I barely made it to the hallway before the sobs hit me. I pressed my palms against my face, trying to stifle the sound, trying to regain control, but the weight of what I had just witnessed was too much. It wasn’t just how women were treated; it was how they were reduced to vessels, their worth determined by the blood in their veins or the ability to serve something greater.
If they didn’t have the right station or lineage, they were cast aside and forced into submission.
I had just helped perpetuate the same lie. The weight of that truth suffocated me as I leaned against the cold wall, fighting back the wave of nausea and grief threatening to tear me apart. The Isle was a living breathing nightmare, and there was no waking from it.
I didn’t hear Alexander approaching, but I felt him—like he was part of the shadows creeping toward me. One moment, I was unraveling, my thoughts spiraling, and the next, his arms wrapped around me, firm, and possessive, as if daring the world to pry me away. There was a gentleness there too, a softness that confused me, made me second-guess my instincts.
He was my captor, but at that moment, I found myself needing the control he provided.
Alexander whispered soft reassurances, his voice a low hum that barely registered over the storm in my mind. Words of comfort, manipulation—both. I clung to them, desperate for anything that would tether me to reality.
He ushered me out of the house with ease, plucking me from my chaos and into his domain. Before I knew it, I was in the back of a sleek sedan, the cool leather seats pressing against me like an embrace I didn’t deserve. My hands trembled as I cradled my head, my thoughts still swirling with images of Emilia's hollowed eyes and Cassandra's twisted smirk. The lifeless child, the eerie calm after the screams—it all lingered, gnawing at the edges of my sanity.
Alexander closed the door softly, the click sealing me off from the horrors behind me. The driver remained impassive and silent, a mere ghost in the front seat, part of the Isle’s cold machinery. I wrapped my arms tighter around my knees, pulling myself into the smallest space possible, as though I could disappear into myself and escape it all. Alexander left me alone in the car for what felt like hours, though it had only been minutes.
The silence didn’t feel like a reprieve. It felt like he had given me just enough time to let the horror sink in and realize I had no way out—except through him. When he returned, slipping into the seat beside me, his hand found its way to my thigh. He didn’t speak right away, but when he did, his voice was laced with a darkness I could feel in my bones. "It’s a hard thing to witness, isn’t it?" he murmured. "To see how fragile life is"
When I said nothing, he let the silence stretch between us like a taut wire until finally, his voice cut through the quiet. "The Isle can be cruel with its rejections," he murmured, his words lingering in the air like a curse.
I turned my head toward him, confusion pulling at my thoughts. "What?"