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Chapter 6: The First Crack
The Glass House hadn't stopped echoing in her head.
Even after the driver dropped them at the tower. Even after the heels came off, and the dress hit the floor, and she stood in the shower until her skin didn't feel like silk anymore.
But the kiss—that calculated act of war—lingered behind her lips like the trace of a toxin she couldn't spit out.
She should've gone to bed.
Instead, Elara padded barefoot down the hall, following a sound she wasn't sure was real at first.
Music.
Not the ambient, pre-programmed playlists that haunted the penthouse like perfume.
Real music.
A piano.
Low. Unpolished. Not performance—exploration. Someone playing the keys like they weren't sure they deserved the sound.
The door to the lounge was half-open.
She pushed it silently.
And there he was.
Caelum sat at the piano in the far corner of the room, shirt sleeves rolled to his elbows, shoulders slightly hunched.
Not elegant.
Not perfect.
Human.
His fingers moved slowly, almost absently, over the keys—no sheet music, no audience. Just a melody that sounded like it had nowhere else to go.
Elara didn't speak.
She watched.
He didn't notice her right away—or maybe he did, and didn't care. The song built into something raw, something bruised. And then, as quickly as it came, it stopped.
He let his hands fall away, resting them on his knees, back rising and falling with a breath he probably didn't want anyone to see.
That's when she spoke.
"You play like someone who's trying not to remember."
He turned.
No anger. Just tired eyes. Old eyes.
"Everyone remembers something," he said. "The trick is making sure it doesn't remember you back."
Elara stepped into the room, the carpet soft under her feet.
"Was that one of your father's?" she asked quietly.
"No," Caelum said. "It was Celine's."
---
Morning came sharp.
Sunlight sliced across the bedroom floor like a warning, and the silence of the penthouse felt heavier than usual. The piano from the night before echoed in her memory—notes she couldn't name but couldn't forget.
Elara hadn't seen Caelum since the moment he said her sister's name.
He'd stood, walked past her like she wasn't there, and disappeared into his office with nothing but a glance.
Now, the silence pressed in again.
Until the chime came.
A soft mechanical ding at the door.
She opened it to find a slim white box—unmarked, tied with silver string. Not a courier. No branding.
Just her name.
Elara
Nothing else.
She took it to the table in the kitchen, hesitated only a moment, then opened it.
Inside: a bracelet.
Delicate gold. Broken clasp. One cracked opal.
She knew it instantly.
Celine's.
It had gone missing months before the accident. Elara had asked about it more than once—Celine always deflected. "It's just a trinket," she'd said. "Nothing special."
Now here it was.
And someone had just delivered it like a ghost returning from the grave.
She turned it over in her fingers. The opal was scorched slightly at the edge—as if it had been burned.
"Elara."
She turned.
Caelum stood in the hallway, one hand in his pocket, the other resting lightly on the doorframe. His face was unreadable.
"Did you do this?" she asked.
He didn't look at the bracelet. He looked at her.
"No."
"Your people?"
"I didn't ask anyone to send you anything."
"But someone did."
A pause.
Then: "Yes."
She stood slowly. Her voice came low.
"You said you wanted truth. Then stop giving me riddles."
"I'm not," Caelum said. "I'm giving you pieces."
He stepped closer, his eyes colder now.
"But if you don't start thinking like the people who hurt her, Elara—"
He reached out, gently turning her hand over, letting the broken bracelet fall into his.
"—you'll never put the rest together."
That night, neither of them pretended to sleep.
The penthouse was too still, the air too charged. The bracelet lay between them—on the table in the lounge, a quiet accusation neither of them touched again.
Elara didn't want to ask what it meant.
And Caelum didn't offer.
But something in the air had changed.
She found herself in the lounge again, barefoot, arms wrapped around herself in a t-shirt she wasn't sure was hers. The city below blinked like it was trying to keep time for them.
Caelum entered without a word.
He didn't look at her. Didn't ask permission. Just sat across from her in one of the low chairs, undoing the first button of his shirt with a motion that somehow felt more honest than anything he'd said aloud.
They sat like that for a long time.
Not talking.
Not needing to.
She should have spoken. Asked about the bracelet. About Celine. About why he played piano like someone mourning something he hadn't buried yet.
But she didn't.
And he didn't push.
Instead, his voice came quietly—barely more than a shadow.
"Your sister used to come to our estate."
Elara looked at him, sharply. "When?"
He shook his head. "It doesn't matter now."
"Of course it does."
"She wasn't supposed to be there. She wasn't invited."
Elara's heart pounded once.
"Was your father—?"
"I said it doesn't matter."
Silence again.
Only this time, it wasn't safe.
Elara stood. Walked to the window.
He didn't follow.
But his voice found her one last time before she left the room.
"She wanted something she shouldn't have. And someone gave it to her."
---
Elara stared at her reflection like it didn't belong to her.
The mirror in the bathroom was too tall, too clean. It didn't distort. It didn't soften. It just told the truth—and tonight, the truth looked like someone she didn't recognize.
Her hair fell in waves she hadn't styled. Her face was bare, but her eyes looked older. Sharper. Like someone who knew the weight of a secret, even if she hadn't been told it yet.
The bracelet sat on the counter beside her toothbrush.
Its broken clasp reflected in the mirror like a smile with a missing tooth.
She touched it once. Lightly. Then looked back at herself.
Celine had been here.
Not in this apartment—this prison of glass and power—but in this story. In this path. In this slow dance with something dangerous dressed as seduction.
She had walked into the fire. Willingly.
And now Elara was following, barefoot and unarmed.
But why?
What had Celine wanted from the Blackthorns?
Money? Fame? Love?
Elara's hand tightened around the sink edge.
No.
Not love.
Celine didn't chase feelings. She chased leverage.
And if Caelum was telling the truth—if her sister had visited the estate, had been warned off, had been uninvited—then something deeper had happened.
Something Elara hadn't seen. Hadn't wanted to see.
And now, in the mirror, it wasn't just herself she saw.
It was the outline of her sister's mistakes.
Wearing her face.
The next morning, she didn't wait for the breakfast tray.
She left her room early. Earlier than the lights. Earlier than the programmed curtain draw. Earlier than the cameras were probably expecting her to move.
She padded barefoot into the kitchen, poured her own coffee, and sat at the bar with the broken bracelet resting beside her cup.
Ten minutes later, the tray still arrived.
Hot tea. Toast. Protein bar. All wrong. All scheduled.
She ignored it.
Caelum entered the room seconds later.
He paused when he saw her there—already awake, already present, already out of rhythm.
She didn't greet him.
She just sipped her coffee and glanced at the untouched tray.
"Your system's wrong," she said.
He stepped farther in, barefoot as well, shirt unbuttoned at the collar. Slightly rumpled.
Less god. More man.
"I'll have it corrected," he said.
"Don't," she replied. "I like being unpredictable."
He moved behind the bar, poured his own coffee. No cream. No sugar.
Then he looked at the bracelet still sitting between them.
"You should put that away."
"Why?"
"It's a message," he said. "And messages are never neutral."
She stared at him.
"You're afraid of it."
"I'm never afraid."
She tilted her head. "That's not what your eyes said when you saw it."
He didn't reply.
Instead, he turned and walked out of the room without another word—without the usual calm control, the perfectly timed cadence.
For the first time since their contract began, Caelum Blackthorn left a room because of her.
And Elara Quinn smiled.
Just a little.