Page 46 of Scarred in Silence (The Twisted Trilogy #2)

Astra

I stand in front of the full-length mirror, watching the ghost of myself take shape. It reminds me of Elliana. Not sure who is staring back at me today. Today she feels powerful.

The black dress hugs me like a secret I never meant to tell—silk, sleeveless, with a slit that cuts high up my thigh.

It’s elegant in the way a knife can be elegant.

My platinum hair setting softly on my shoulders like a halo of frost, framing a face that doesn’t beg to be understood anymore.

It demands to be remembered. To be heard.

Lucien hasn’t said anything since I stepped out of the bathroom.

He just watches me. Always.

His tie hangs loose around his neck, the white shirt already pressed, the black slacks sculpted to his frame like they were designed for bloodstains and boardrooms alike. He looks like power incarnate, but it’s the stillness that unnerves me.

“You don’t like it?” I ask, smoothing the fabric at my hip.

“I didn’t say that,” he answers, voice thick.

He moves behind me and rests one hand on my waist. In the mi rror, our reflection is something mythical. Two devils playing dress-up in human skin. Perfect.

“It’s a lot,” I whisper.

“So are you,” he replies.

I bite the inside of my cheek. My heart pounds, but not because I’m afraid of my parents. Not anymore. It’s everything else—the silence they left me in. The shame. The disappointment they carved into me like scripture.

“Are you sure you want to go through with this?” Lucien asks, his thumb tracing a slow circle over my hipbone.

“No,” I answer. “But I have to.”

I don’t want closure. I want confrontation. I want them to see what they tried to bury. I want them to sit at their pristine little table in their too-clean house and choke on the realization that I survived anyway.

That I became something they couldn’t ignore.

Lucien lifts a strand of my white-blonde hair and kisses it.

“They’ll hate this,” I murmur.

“Good,” he says simply.

I grab the black leather jacket off the bed and shrug it on. It used to be his. It still smells like him—cologne and gunpowder and the kind of sin that leaves bruises shaped like promises.

“Lipstick?” he asks.

“Already packed it. Red.”

His smile is faint but sharp. “Of course it is.”

He finishes tightening his tie in the mirror while I buckle the ankle strap on my heel. I hate that this feels like a performance, but maybe it’s always been one. Maybe every interaction with them has been staged since the moment I stopped being who they wanted me to be.

Lucien watches me like I’m a weapon he forged himself. Like h e knows exactly how much damage I can do.

“I’ll follow your lead,” he says.

“No,” I say, standing tall. “You don’t need to. I know the lines by heart.”

He picks up the small velvet box from the nightstand, the bullet he gave me, and slips it into his jacket pocket. I don’t ask. I don’t need to.

It’s probably the final nail.

We walk toward the door like we’re walking into a battlefield—and maybe we are.

Except this time, I’m not the casualty.

I’m the fucking reckoning.

* * *

Their house hasn’t changed.

The driveway is still perfect. The hedges are trimmed like the world might end if a leaf dares go rogue. The same bricks, same cream columns. Same sterile coldness that looks expensive but feels like abandonment.

Lucien’s hand hovers over the small of my back as we walk up the steps. He doesn’t touch me—doesn’t have to. His presence is enough.

I rang the bell two minutes ago. They knew I was coming. This silence is a choice.

The door finally creaks open.

Verona stands there in pearls and disappointment, her expression frozen in that tight-lipped socialite smile she saves for church and charity fundraisers.

Her eyes skim me, pausing for just a moment too long on the platinum hair and black leather jacket.

“Well,” she says flatly. “You look…”

“Alive?” I offer, tilting my head. “I know. Tragic, right?”

She doesn’t laugh. Doesn’t even blink.

Gideon appears behind her, still in a pressed shirt, sleeves rolled precisely two cuffs. He doesn’t offer a hug. No warmth. Just a judgmental once-over, the same look he used to give me before locking the bathroom cabinet.

“I see you arrived on time,” he says, eyes narrowing on Lucien.

“You know Lucien,” I say evenly. “You know—my sentence.”

Lucien smirks, stepping forward and extending a hand that neither of them takes.

“We’re here because Astra thought she owed you this,” he says, voice smooth as smoke but sharp enough to cut arteries.

Verona steps aside without a word. We follow her into the sitting room—the one with untouched furniture and shelves of books no one ever reads. I haven’t been here in weeks, but it feels like no time has passed at all.

Except me. I passed. I burned through time like a match.

I sit on the edge of the antique sofa. Lucien remains standing.

“So,” Verona begins, crossing one leg over the other. “How long do we have to pretend this isn’t some cry for attention?”

I blink. “Excuse me?”

“Don’t act surprised, darling,” she says, voice brittle and bored. “The hair. The outfit. The man. It’s all performance art, and frankly, I expected something more original.”

Lucien stiffens beside me. I place a hand on his thigh—not to calm him, but to anchor myself.

“This isn’t a performance,” I say. “This is who I am now.”

Gideon snorts. “You expect us to believe that? After everyt hing you’ve done? Running off, whoring yourself out, overdosing in God knows where—and now you come here like we’re supposed to applaud the act?”

My fingers curl into fists in my lap. “I didn’t come for applause. I came to see if there was anything left in this house besides hypocrisy and vodka breath.”

Verona flinches, but Gideon just laughs.

“Oh, you think you’re powerful now? You’re still the same damaged little girl who begged for attention in a hospital bed.”

Lucien moves.

Fast.

He crosses the room in two strides and grabs Gideon by the collar, slamming him against the marble mantle. A framed photo crashes to the floor.

“You don’t get to speak to her like that,” Lucien scowls, his voice venomous. “You don’t get to sit in your glass fucking palace and throw stones at the daughter you shattered.”

Verona shrieks. “Let him go!”

Lucien ignores her.

“Do you know where I found her?” he hisses. “Do you have any idea what she survived while you sat here polishing your reputation and pretending she didn’t exist?”

“Lucien—” I whisper.

He doesn’t stop.

“She was half-dead in a stranger’s house, bones showing through her skin, arms littered with tracks. I had to drag her back to life with my bare fucking hands. And you—” he shoves Gideon harder against the mantle, voice deadly low “—you stood by and watched her drown. You let her become prey.”

Gideon spits at his feet. “You think you’re a savior?”

Lu cien’s laugh is hollow. “No. I’m a monster. But at least I protect what’s mine.”

He lets go.

Gideon stumbles back, straightening his shirt like that’ll sew his pride back together.

Verona stands, jaw trembling. “I can’t believe you brought him here.”

“I thought you deserved to see what you created,” I say quietly, standing.

Verona sneers. “You always were ungrateful.”

“Ungrateful?” I laugh—a sound sharp enough to draw blood. “You mean for the silence? For the blame? For ignoring the signs until I had to carve them into my own skin?”

Lucien grabs my hand. “We’re done here.”

But I don’t move. Not yet.

“I died in this house long before the drugs, Verona,” I say. “You buried me in pearls and pretended not to hear the screaming. And now you can rot in that silence.”

Gideon opens his mouth, but Lucien turns back one last time.

“If I ever find out you speak to her again, if you so much as look at her the wrong way, I’ll burn this fucking house to the ground—with both of you inside.”

The room freezes.

And then we walk out—silent, united, unbroken.

Not once do I look back.

They already spent years pretending I didn’t exist.

Now?

I’ll return the favor.

* * *

We don’t say a word on the drive back.

The silence between us isn’t heavy. It’s light. Cleansing. Like the sky opened just to rinse the poison from my skin.

My forehead rests against the car window as familiar roads blur past. The setting sun casts long shadows across the fields, but I don’t flinch. I don’t fold.

I exhale—slow, long. It doesn’t catch in my throat like it used to.

Lucien’s hand slips over the console and wraps around mine. His grip is firm, grounding, and possessive. I crave it. It feels real .

“They’re nothing,” I murmur, still staring out at the fields.

“I know,” he says softly.

“They’ve always been nothing. I just… didn’t want to believe it.”

His thumb brushes over my knuckles. “Belief dies slower than love.”

I huff a laugh—shaky, but genuine. When did he become so poetic? Oh, probably whenever he started writing himself notes. I laugh internally.

When we pull into the driveway, the house feels less like a prison and more like… space. Space to breathe. Space to be . I step out before the engine fully shuts off, letting the sweet air fill my lungs and sweep through my hair.

I take off my jacket and let it fall to the ground. I don’t care. I walk barefoot through the gravel, across the grass, up the front steps like I’m walking into a new version of myself.

Inside, Lucien follows without a word.

I walk straight to the living room and sink onto the couch, pulling my legs under me. He stands near the door like he’s unsure of what I need.

“I feel different,” I say.

His brow furrows.

I meet his gaze. “Not silenced. Not numb. Just… light.”

Lucien walks over and crouches in front of me, resting his arms on my knees. “You did that.”

I nod slowly. “Yeah. I did.”

A laugh escapes my lips. It bursts out before I can stop it. And then I’m laughing harder, breathless and half-hysterical.

He watches me like I’ve lost my mind.

“Sorry,” I say between gasps. “It’s just… I finally told them. Everything. I let it out, and it didn’t kill me.”

“No,” Lucien murmurs. “It made you impossible to ignore.”

I reach out and run my fingers through his hair.

“You didn’t have to defend me like that.”

“I didn’t have to,” he echoes. “I wanted to.”

I bite the inside of my cheek. “I thought it would hurt more.”

“What?”

“Saying goodbye to people who were supposed to love me.”

Lucien leans closer. “They never did, Astra. Not the way you needed. Not the way you deserved.”

He kisses my knee, just once, and I swear I feel it in my ribs.

“I feel free,” I whisper.

His eyes search mine.

“For the first time in my whole life… I feel like I belong to myself.”

He nods, but doesn’t speak. There’s a weight in his silence, like he knows exactly what that kind of freedom costs. Like he’s paid it in blood, too.

“I don’t want to run anymore,” I say.

He doesn’t blink.

“I don’t want to be numb. I want to feel everything—even the pa in. Even the grief.”

Lucien presses his forehead to mine. “I’ll feel it with you.”

We sit there like that, skin to skin, heart to heart. And for once, nothing about it feels complicated. Not a power play. Not a trap. Just this.

Just the now. I never want it to end.

I want to feel him. I need to feel him.

I stand, giving him a needy look. He chuckles. I sprint to the bedroom.

He always knows what I need. Even in the silence.