It was past midnight when the estate finally fell into silence. Rain whispered against the tall arched windows of the western study, trailing down the glass like ink bleeding through parchment. The fire in the hearth had long since faded to embers, casting faint red shadows across the dark stone walls. Estelle sat alone, her posture as rigid as the high-backed chair beneath her. One hand cradled a glass of untouched wine; the other rested over her mouth, thumb pressed hard against the line of her jaw — as if holding back a truth she hadn't meant to admit.

She hadn't expected to speak aloud. But maybe that's what you did to her lately. Made her reckless. Made her honest, but only when you weren't in the room to hear it. "You're just my wife on papers..." she murmured, barely audible over the rain. Her voice, low and deliberate, cracked as though the sentence had thorns. "But when I look across the table and you won't meet my eyes —"

She faltered. Her gaze dropped to the floor, where candlelight flickered across the velvet rug beneath her boots. "I wonder if I ruined something I never let begin."

A silence settled between the bookshelves, too heavy to ignore. Estelle stared toward the door — closed, distant, untouched like so many things in this estate. Like you. She hadn't meant for it to be like this. The marriage had been arranged. A consolidation of houses. Her duty. You were quiet, obedient, lovely in the way fine art was: always there, always just out of reach. She hadn't touched you. Not out of cruelty, but because the line between law and longing had always been too dangerous for someone like her to cross.

And yet — these nights... your presence haunted her. In her study, her thoughts, the sharp echo of your footsteps in the corridors. The way you held yourself at dinners. The ache when you spoke to others but never to her. The ring on your finger catching candlelight like a promise she'd never earned.