Dominick POV:
The ambulance sirens were loud, but the silence in my head was louder.
I sat on the bumper of the firetruck. Chastity was sobbing into my shirt.
"She went crazy, Dom," she wailed. "She attacked me. She set the fire."
I nodded, but my eyes were fixed on the smoking penthouse.
Why didn't she follow?
"Did you see her come out?" I asked a firefighter.
"No, sir. Top floor is gutted. If anyone was in there... they're gone."
A hollow ache opened up in my chest.
I closed my eyes and reached for the bond. Usually, it was a dull thrum I ignored.
Now, just static.
"No," I whispered.
"Dom?" Chastity looked up. "It's for the best, baby. She was dangerous."
Days passed. No body found. Police assumed incineration or escape.
I tried to move on. I had Chastity. I had the heir.
But the new mansion felt wrong.
I found myself walking through the rooms, sniffing. Searching for snowdrops and honey. Annis's scent.
Now, everything smelled of Chastity's roses. Overpowering. Sickening.
I went to my study. I unlocked my phone.
I scrolled back to the old messages.
Annis: Dinner is ready.
Annis: Happy Birthday, Dom.
I had never replied.
I opened a new message.
To: Annis
Where are you? Come back. That is an order.
I hit send.
Message Delivery Failed.
She had destroyed her SIM card.
Panic, cold and sharp, pricked at my skin.
I called my Private Investigator.
"Find her," I barked. "And find out what happened that night. I want the security footage from the hallway. I want Chastity's medical records cross-referenced. Everything."
"She'll be back," I told the empty room. "She has nowhere else to go."
I didn't know she was already four thousand miles away, in London.
And I didn't know that the silence in my head wasn't just distance. It was death.
