Chapter 2 Shadows Between Vows

The house was a mausoleum after midnight, the only sound the slow tick of the grandfather clock echoing through the empty halls. Dante Moretti sat alone in his study, the city lights leaking through tall windows, casting fractured shadows across his sharp features.

He should have been celebrating. He had the bride he wanted-the deal sealed. But as he stared into the flickering flame of the single candle before him, a storm churned beneath his calm exterior.

Aria Valente.

Her name was a curse and a prayer wrapped into one.

From the moment he first saw her, sharp as a blade and twice as dangerous, something in him had shifted. Something he had spent years locking away beneath layers of duty and ice.

He should have hated her. Everyone had. The Valente family had been the Moretti's enemy for decades, a wound that festered with every violent exchange, every broken truce.

But Dante never hated Aria.

He'd watched her grow from afar, a wildfire boxed in silk and bone, fierce enough to burn down the entire city if she ever let herself go. And maybe that was the problem-because the more he saw, the more he realized she wasn't the enemy.

She was the only thing that ever made him want to break the rules.

The arrangement was supposed to be business. Cold. Calculated. But as he sat there, the memory of her red dress, the fire in her eyes, haunted him like a ghost refusing to rest.

His fingers drummed against the polished wood desk.

He wasn't a man who wasted time.

Yet, with Aria, every second stretched-taut, dangerous, alive.

He remembered the first time he saw her, years ago, at a Valente gathering he'd infiltrated for information. She had been a shadow in the corner, watching, waiting, with that defiant spark no one dared to touch.

That night, something inside him clenched.

Not desire. Not hate. Something else.

Respect.

And fear.

Because she was a storm, and storms didn't bend.

Now, she was his wife.

A fact that felt less like victory and more like a sentence.

He stood, pacing the room, the shadows dancing around him as if mocking the war inside his chest.

What was he supposed to do with a wife who hated him? Who fought him at every turn?

Maybe that was the answer.

Maybe she was the only one who could challenge him.

A slow smile crept across his lips.

The devil did wear vows-but he also craved fire.

Back in her suite, Aria sat perched on the edge of the bed, eyes fixed on the window where the city pulsed below. Her heart still hammered, a wild thing caged inside ribs too stubborn to break.

She had survived the day. The ceremony. The kiss that tasted of ice and ownership.

But now, alone in the silence, she felt the weight of the deal settle over her like a shroud.

She hated him.

She needed to hate him.

Because if she didn't, if the truth clawed out, she might never survive this game.

Her fingers traced the edge of the red silk gown, now draped across a chair.

*He thinks he owns me.*

But Aria was no one's possession.

Her lips curved into a bitter smile.

*Not even Dante Moretti.*

The house creaked, footsteps quiet but deliberate.

Dante.

He didn't knock. Never did.

Aria's breath caught as the door eased open and he stepped inside, closing it softly behind him.

She met his gaze, fierce and unyielding.

"Why are you here?" Her voice was steady, but the question hung heavy in the air.

He moved closer, hands shoved into pockets. "Could ask you the same."

"Don't."

He smirked, that cold, unreadable expression she both loathed and craved.

"I'm not here to fight."

She raised an eyebrow. "Then what?"

"To talk."

Aria's laugh was a razor's edge. "After a day like today? You want to talk?"

He didn't back down. "I want to start something."

Her heart skipped, betraying her mask.

"Start what?"

"Something real."

The words landed like fire.

She stepped back, wary but drawn in.

"Real?"

He nodded. "I've spent years playing the perfect heir. The cold prince of the Moretti legacy. But you-" His voice softened just enough to shatter ice. "You make me want to be more."

Aria's breath hitched.

This was new. Dangerous.

"Why tell me this now?"

"Because I can't keep pretending."

The silence stretched, charged.

Then Dante closed the distance, his hand brushing her cheek, warm and demanding.

"Tell me to stop," he said.

Aria's defenses wavered.

She shook her head, barely a whisper.

"Don't."

For the first time, the devil behind the vows showed a crack of fire.

Dante's fingers lingered against her skin, a touch that was both a promise and a challenge. The fire in Aria's veins flickered dangerously, but she held her ground, refusing to give him the satisfaction of breaking first.

"You think this changes anything?" she whispered, voice rough but steady. "You're the devil in a suit, Dante. And I'm the Valente who survived hell."

He smiled-barely. "Good. I like a challenge."

Her heart pounded in rhythm with the storm brewing outside the window, rain tapping like a drum on the glass. The night had shifted; it no longer felt like a cage but the beginning of a war neither of them was prepared to lose.

"Why did you never tell me?" Aria's voice cracked, raw with years of unanswered questions.

Dante's eyes darkened, shadows of the man he tried to hide surfacing. "Because I was supposed to hate you. Because this," he gestured between them, "was never supposed to be real."

She searched his face, finding the vulnerability he buried beneath layers of ice. "Then why now?"

"Because," he said slowly, "I can't lose you. Not like this."

The words hung between them, heavier than any vow.

Aria swallowed, the walls she built trembling. "So what now? Do we pretend to be enemies for the world, or start burning everything down?"

Dante's lips curved into a slow, dangerous grin. "I say we burn it all-slow and deliberate."

Their eyes locked, the space between them crackling with unspoken desires and the promise of war.

Outside, the storm raged on. Inside, two souls danced on the edge of fire and ice, neither willing to be the first to fall.