The house had shifted.
Not in the obvious ways—not in thunder or storm. But in its breathing.
It exhaled before she opened her eyes.
Rhea sat upright in bed, heart already ticking faster than it should. The fire was lit.
But she hadn't lit it.
The door she'd locked the night before—twice—now hung slightly ajar.
She rose slowly, bare feet brushing against the cold wood floor. The warmth from the fire didn't reach the rest of the suite.
She crossed the room silently, pressing her palm to the same wallpaper she'd touched yesterday. Still warm.
But this warmth felt different.
Her silk robe clung to the outline of her thighs as she walked toward the balcony, her hair still tousled. The early light seeped in through sheer curtains, soft and silvered, not yet harsh enough to burn away secrets.
She slid the glass door open and stepped outside.
The estate was already alive.
Below her, a slow parade of workers moved across the gravel path, lifting heavy antiques from delivery trucks to the grand entrance. Almirahs. Persian rugs. Ornate sideboards covered in thick quilts.
Restoration. Her mother had arranged for it before—
She stilled.
No.
Not him.
But it was.
There—among the workers, shirtless and indifferent to the cold—was a man who looked like he didn't belong to this decade, let alone to this task.
Tall. Dangerous. Carved. Unfazed.
His dark hair, tousled and slightly wet, curled at the edges as though the morning wind had dragged fingers through it. His skin glistened with a fine sheen of sweat, clinging to every clean line of muscle—chest, arms, abdomen, back.
He bent to lift one side of a mahogany wardrobe, and his veins flared across his forearms like lightning etched beneath skin.
His back flexed—broad, powerful, impossibly still.
A long scar kissed the right side of his back—thin, pale, but jagged. Evidence of violence. Or punishment. Or survival.
He doesn't look like the others.
He doesn't move like them either.
He's not helping—he's claiming.
She leaned forward slightly, her fingers tightening around the iron rail. She should've looked away. She didn't.
His eyes, when he turned slightly—grey. Sharp. Clear as fractured glass.
A look that didn't ask questions. It unraveled them.
Her heart stumbled.
Then a maid approached him, stepping delicately across the path. She held out a tall glass of something cold, condensation fogging the rim.
"Mr. Vale, would you prefer this inside?"
The name hit her in the chest.
Mr. Vale.
The man she had just undressed with her gaze—the one who moved like command itself—was Lucien Vale.
She stepped back from the balcony, breath caught somewhere between her throat and pride.
Of course it was him.
Not a worker.
Not a stranger.
Not beneath her.
Lucien.
The boy who once kissed her like a secret.
Now a man who stood shirtless in her inheritance like he'd never left.
And maybe he hadn't.
She stayed inside longer than she needed to.
She didn't rush.
Instead, she moved toward the ensuite bath, turned on the brass fixtures, and stepped under the stream of hot water that filled the room with steam and silence.
She washed her hair, rinsed the sweat of sleep from her skin, and tried not to think of the man below—his back, his voice, his silence.
By the time she stepped out, towel-dried and cooled, the fire had begun to dim.
She crossed to the vanity, brushing out her damp hair with slow, practiced strokes. Then to her armoire—selecting a pale satin blouse with delicate pearl buttons she fastened slowly, methodically. She tucked it into tailored trousers the color of deep wine. Added earrings. A touch of gloss. The scent of amber clove trailed behind her.
The kind of effort you make when you refuse to appear shaken.
She paused at the mirror.
The reflection didn't lie—but it didn't offer answers either.
Only then—when her armor was back in place—did she step into the hallway.
By the time she returned to the corridor, Lucien was dressed—charcoal shirt rolled at the sleeves, dark trousers, boots still faintly dirt-dusted from the grounds. No sweat now. Just stillness.
And power.
He stood at the end of the hall, speaking to Agnes in hushed tones. His profile was all angles and restraint, carved from some colder material than flesh. Rhea slowed. He didn't look at her.
He knew.
That she'd watched. That she'd looked too long. That she wasn't ready for what she saw.
But he didn't grant her shame. Or recognition. Or even a glance.
He turned—casual, unhurried—and walked the opposite direction.
"Lucien," she said, sharper than intended.
He stopped. Slowly pivoted. Let his eyes trail from her bare ankles to her throat, expression unreadable.
"Did you sleep well, Ms. Voss?"
His voice was low, polite. Indifferent.
But beneath the polish, it hummed like a warning.
She hated that her breath caught.
"I locked my door last night," she said.
He nodded once. "And it opened for you this morning. As it should."
Was that an answer? Or a threat?
Before she could speak, Evie appeared behind her, holding a small ceramic pot with dirt under her nails.
"There you are," Evie said brightly. "I was just about to show Agnes where to put the greenhouse shelving. Lucien said there's an entire east wing with unused sunlight."
Rhea's head turned sharply. "He did?"
Lucien offered nothing. Just that slight, elusive smile.
Not amused. Not kind. Just… knowing.
"Funny," Rhea said, voice dropping. "I didn't realize you were giving tours."
Lucien's gaze flicked to her.
"I've always known the rooms," he said.
"Even when they were locked to you."
Evie glanced between them, sensing something thick between the lines. She shifted her weight.
"I—uh—I'll be in the garden," she mumbled. "Come when you're ready?"
She disappeared down the stairs, too polite to ask.
Too naive to understand.
Rhea stayed where she was.
Lucien turned again, and as he walked away, his voice drifted back.
"Your father didn't believe in leaving things to strangers."
He paused.
"Not unless they returned."
Rhea stood frozen.
Not a threat.
Not a welcome.
Just a reminder.
And maybe a warning:
The estate may have waited for her.
But Lucien Vale never left.
The dining room awaited—vast and sunlit, with windows so tall they swallowed entire columns of morning.
Rhea entered with practiced poise, every step composed, the echoes of her heels swallowed by Persian rugs. The long table was already set—silver cutlery glinting, porcelain tea cups resting on bone-white saucers. Bowls of sugared fruit. Warm brioche. Fresh cream.
Lucien sat at the far end, a broadsheet open in one hand, his other wrapped loosely around a coffee cup. He didn't look up.
Evie was mid-sentence, laughter dancing on her lips as she stirred honey into her tea. "And I swear the fern is actually thriving now. Which is shocking, considering I forgot to water it for three days."
Rhea moved toward her seat, allowing her gaze to travel down the table—slow, unhurried, like a queen descending a court she hadn't summoned.
She noticed the way Lucien's jaw flexed, just once.
A betrayal of attention.
Evie beamed. "You're just in time! I was about to ask Lucien if the eastern gardens have foxgloves. Gran always said they bloomed best in cursed soil."
That earned a flicker of movement from behind Lucien's paper.
Rhea slid into her chair. "And what did our charming groundskeeper say?"
Evie tilted her head. "He said the foxgloves know better than to grow in places they're not wanted."
Rhea sipped her coffee. "Did he, now?"
Lucien finally lowered the paper—folded it with deliberate calm—and met her eyes.
Grey. Unforgiving. Cool as a blade left in winter.
"There's always a bloom for every kind of soil," he said.
Then returned to his cup.
Evie blinked, clearly missing the current passing beneath the surface.
Rhea didn't.
She tore a piece of brioche, her fingers steady. "Let's just hope this house still remembers how to grow something other than ghosts."
Later that morning, the sisters wandered through the garden paths, the sun now draped in a gauze of cloud. Rhea's heels sank slightly into the softened ground, trailing behind Evie's lighter steps.
Evie knelt near a stone-bordered patch of soil, fingers curling around a small trowel as she began planting fresh ferns.
Nearby, Agnes stood with her arms folded, ever-present, gaze distant but alert.
"The eastern greenhouse really is untouched," Evie said as she pressed down the soil gently.
Agnes glanced over. "Mr. Vale ensured it remained so."
"All of it?"
A pause. "Only the parts your mother considered worth keeping."
Evie brushed a strand of hair behind her ear. "She used to say the house was alive. I thought that was just poetry."
"Perhaps it was. And perhaps not," Agnes replied. "But even poetry holds truth, in pieces."
Rhea said nothing. She stood nearby, arms crossed, gaze flicking to the treeline, the distant edge of the estate that always seemed to watch back.
That night, the fire in her suite crackled low, casting shifting shadows up the high walls. Rhea sat curled on the chaise by the window, her robe draped over her knees. A glass of wine untouched.
She couldn't sleep.
The silence was never empty in this house.
Then—music.
Faint, tentative. Piano keys. Not a melody. Not yet. Just... notes.
Remembering their shape.
She stood slowly, barefoot, and opened the door to the corridor.
Empty.
But the sound tugged her eastward, past darkened sconces and rows of portraits with eyes that followed.
The library doors were ajar.
She slipped inside, breath caught.
The piano stood in the corner, old and polished. Its keys still.
But someone had just left it.
The warmth of a body still lingered in the air.
And a single page of music, dog-eared, sat open like an invitation.
Rhea didn't touch it.
She stood still in the quiet and wondered—
Had the house only been waiting for her?
Or had he been playing all along?