Rochester, New York — 1933. The Roosevelt Ballroom
The Roosevelt Ballroom was a cathedral of decadence tonight, its chandeliers dripping with golden light, its marble floors reflecting every shimmer of satin and every glitter of diamond. Jazz sang from the stage like something alive, a wild saxophone crooning against the gentle clink of champagne glasses. For a night, the Great Depression had no dominion here.
Rosalie Lillian Hale stood near the mirrored wall, a glass of sparkling cider poised in her manicured hand. Her lavender gown hugged her waist like a lover and fell like water around her hips, each stitch whispering old money and new confidence. Her platinum curls, immaculately arranged, gleamed under the golden light.
She was the most beautiful woman in the room.
Until they arrived.
The music stuttered, the atmosphere shifted, and heads turned like compass needles. A pause—brief but palpable—rippled across the ballroom.
At the top of the grand staircase stood the Cullen family. Not walked. Stood. Like royalty surveying their court.
Dr. Carlisle Cullen descended first, a tall Adonis in a sharply cut midnight tuxedo. His presence was quiet but commanding, the kind of man who could calm a riot or start one, depending on whether he smiled.
On his arm, Esme Cullen moved with elegance that defied logic. Dove grey silk glided around her, and her smile was the gentle kind that made you feel both seen and unworthy. She was grace with a heartbeat.
Edward Masen followed with the gait of a Byronic ghost—elegant, aloof, and so devastatingly attractive it hurt to look at him too long. His crimson pocket square was the only rebellion in a suit so perfectly tailored it should be criminal. His gaze swept the room, detached and disinterested, until it landed on Royce King II.
And then...
Hadrian Peverell.
He wore white—an ivory dinner jacket over black trousers, looking like some mythic hero dragged into the present just to ruin the curve for mortal men. His jawline could have been a weapon, and his smile was the kind that got girls disowned by their fathers. But it was the eyes—those piercing emerald eyes—that gave him away. Eyes like truth, like secrets, like sins you'd beg to commit again.
He leaned toward the woman beside him and said something that made her laugh—a rich, smoky sound that wrapped itself around every heart in the room.
Daenerys Cullen.
If Hadrian was myth, she was legend.
Her dress was deep violet, a silk so rich it practically moaned. Her hair, white as moonlight, was pulled into a twisted chignon that exposed the dangerous slope of her neck. And those eyes—violet like a bruise, or a prophecy—shimmered with something untamed.
Rosalie's hand clenched tighter around her glass.
"Oh my stars," Evelyn Greene gasped beside her. "Who are they?"
"The Cullens," Rosalie replied, smile sharp. "Local royalty. If royalty lived in a glacier."
Royce King II adjusted his cufflinks with the smirk of a man who thought everything could be bought. "Which one is that?" he asked, nodding toward Daenerys.
"Carlisle's sister," Rosalie said. "Daenerys."
"Daenerys," Royce repeated, like it tasted expensive. His eyes dragged over her like fingerprints. "She married?"
"Betrothed," Rosalie snapped.
Royce chuckled. "Doesn't mean she's off-limits."
Something in Rosalie twisted. She didn't know if it was jealousy, fury, or shame. But it stung.
--
Across the ballroom...
"Ten bucks says the blonde in lavender wants to stab you with a butter knife," Hadrian murmured, his hand settling at the small of Daenerys's back.
She arched a brow, amused. "What did I do now?"
"Breathed," he said, deadpan.
Daenerys smirked, violet eyes glinting under the chandelier. "That's Rosalie Hale. Pretty. But insecure. Looks at me like I stole her spotlight and didn't even say thank you."
Hadrian leaned in closer. "You didn't."
"I never say thank you."
Hadrian's grin grew crooked, his voice dipping. "That's my girl."
She nudged him with her shoulder. "You should kiss me. Right here. In front of all these whispering little aristocrats."
"And ruin the mystery?" Hadrian teased. "I thought you liked to keep them guessing."
Daenerys turned to face him fully. "Only when I'm not craving the taste of your mouth."
He blinked. "God, you're going to get me killed."
"You're immortal."
"Exactly. That's a long time to be wrapped around your little finger."
"You love it."
"I do."
--
By the punch bowl...
Edward stood still, his jaw tightening.
"Royce King is imagining things about Daenerys that would get a man shot," he muttered.
Esme joined him, her voice soft. "I assume you mean metaphorically."
"Unfortunately."
Carlisle appeared, calm as a glacier. "Keep an eye on him. He's not just rude. He's dangerous."
Edward turned, surprise flickering in his eyes. "You're worried for Daenerys?"
Carlisle took a sip of champagne. "No. I'm worried for Rosalie."
Esme stilled. "You think...?"
Carlisle nodded slowly. "She's already bleeding. She just doesn't know it yet."
--
Rosalie caught Daenerys's eye across the floor.
Daenerys smiled. Not kindly.
Hadrian leaned down and whispered something in her ear. She laughed again, head tilted back, hand on his chest.
He looked at her like he'd burn the world to keep that laugh alive.
Rosalie lowered her glass. Her teeth hurt from grinding. Her cheeks burned. She had never been the background before.
She was the heroine.
She had to be.
And if she wasn't?
She'd rewrite the story.
No matter what it took.
—
One Week Before the Wedding
The air smelled of lilacs and cigarette ash, that peculiar perfume of early summer and the secrets it carried. Rosalie Hale stepped off the streetcar with the kind of grace that turned heads without meaning to. She wore an ivory day dress with delicate embroidery at the cuffs, her matching lace gloves pulled snug. Every inch of her was elegance stitched in silk. And entirely out of place.
Because this was not her part of town.
Not dangerous, but decidedly the "wrong" kind—flower boxes instead of fountains, laughter instead of gossip, and people who worked because they had to, not because it gave them something to sigh about at luncheons. Rosalie's heels clicked along cracked pavement as she passed porches with creaking swings and the faint hum of radios. She hesitated at the gate of a small house with green shutters and a crooked "Welcome" sign painted in cheery yellow letters.
She knocked once, twice.
The door flew open as if it had been waiting.
"ROSIE!" Vera practically sang, sweeping Rosalie into a dramatic hug that included one arm, a tea towel, and the smell of cinnamon. "You look like someone ironed you onto the cover of Vogue."
Rosalie arched a brow. "I do not look ironed."
"Oh, sweetheart, you look pressed, polished, and so perfect I'm getting hives just standing next to you." Vera gave her a once-over, grinning. "Don't tell me this is what you call casual."
"It is casual," Rosalie said primly, stepping inside. "This is my understated ivory."
"You wore ivory to a house with finger paint on the walls," Vera said, shutting the door with a flourish. "You're brave. Or a little bit stupid."
Rosalie laughed despite herself, shedding her gloves with a practiced flick. "How have you not been arrested for treason against high society?"
"Oh, they tried once," Vera said, leading her into the kitchen. "But I baked the judge a pie and he forgot what he was mad about."
The house smelled of brown sugar and cinnamon, and something buttery was cooling near the open window. The inside was a mismatched quilt of sunshine and love: crocheted throws on the chairs, a chipped teapot whistling cheerfully on the stove, a radio murmuring Billie Holiday's voice like it was part of the walls. It felt alive.
Then came the sound of soft, unmistakable giggling.
A blur of motion exploded through the archway—small, sticky, and fast.
"Tommy—no running near the oven!" Vera called, even as the little boy barreled into her legs and latched on like a koala.
Rosalie's eyes softened as she knelt gracefully. "And who is this little ruffian?"
Tommy peeked up, his brown eyes sparkling, dimples as deep as rain puddles.
"Say hi, Tommy," Vera prompted.
Tommy instead shoved his thumb in his mouth and leaned farther into his mother's apron, clearly delighted with himself.
"He thinks you're a duchess," Vera said, ruffling his curls.
"Well, he's not wrong," Rosalie murmured, brushing a golden curl from his forehead. Her fingers paused, just a moment longer than they needed to.
Vera caught the look. "Uh-oh. That's the face you made when you saw that baby carriage at Marshall's and told me you 'didn't like children.'"
"I don't," Rosalie said. "They drool and smell and ruin good silk."
Tommy chose that exact moment to crawl into her lap and bury his face in her shoulder.
"Oh, he's ruining that ivory," Vera smirked, hands on her hips.
Rosalie sighed but didn't move him. "I'll have you know this child is an excellent judge of character."
"He also ate chalk this morning."
"So did half of the Daughters of the American Revolution," Rosalie replied, deadpan.
Vera snorted, actually snorted, and leaned against the counter. "Oh, I've missed this."
Rosalie looked up. "What, sarcasm?"
"You. Being you," Vera said gently. "Not… whatever version of you the engagement turned you into. The frostbitten duchess of New York."
Rosalie said nothing for a moment.
Instead, she glanced around the kitchen. The table was set for tea—mismatched mugs, plates with faded violets, and molasses cookies cooling by the window like a Norman Rockwell painting. It was everything her life wasn't. Not curated, not controlled. Just... real.
"Smells incredible in here," Rosalie said finally.
"Molasses and rebellion," Vera winked. "Henry says they taste like a union strike in your mouth."
"Do union strikes taste like cinnamon?" Rosalie asked dryly.
"If I'm baking them, they do."
Before Rosalie could respond, the front door creaked open.
Boots scraped against the floor. Heavy steps. Solid.
"Speak of the devil and he tracks mud into my foyer," Vera muttered, already straightening her skirt.
Henry appeared in the kitchen doorway, all rolled sleeves and stubble, a sheen of honest sweat on his forehead. He looked tired—but in the way people look tired after a job well done. His eyes landed on Vera, and they lit up like dawn through stained glass.
"I'm home," he said softly.
Vera crossed the floor, took his face in her hands, and kissed him like they had all the time in the world.
"Long day?" she murmured.
"Only bearable knowing you'd be here," he murmured back.
Rosalie, still holding Tommy, cleared her throat loudly. "If you two start undressing each other, I will walk into traffic."
Henry grinned, stepping inside. "Rosie. Always a pleasure."
"You say that like you mean it," she quipped.
"I do," he said honestly, reaching over to tickle Tommy's foot. "He's glued to you, huh?"
"I have that effect on toddlers and tax auditors," she said primly.
They sat, the four of them, in a kitchen too small for secrets. Rosalie sipped tea from a cracked mug and nibbled on cookies she'd never admit were better than the ones from the Waldorf Astoria. They talked—about Vera's latest baking disaster ("The cake exploded, Rosie. It actually exploded"), about Henry's shift at the press, about Tommy's new obsession with ants.
Somewhere between laughter and the last bite of cookie, Rosalie forgot about the gold-embossed invitations and the bridal fittings and the cold smile of the man waiting to own her like a horse in a stable.
And then, like a ripple in the water, it hit her.
Not loudly. Not with drama. Just… a quiet shift.
Royce had never looked at her like Henry looked at Vera.
He'd looked at her like property. Like something he'd earned. She'd mistaken that for love because it came in diamonds and promises.
But Vera—Vera had nothing but this tiny house, that little boy, and a man who would crawl across coals just to see her smile.
And she was happy.
Rosalie stayed longer than she should have, letting Tommy nap against her shoulder. When she finally stood to leave, Vera tilted her head.
"You alright, Rosie?"
Rosalie hesitated. Smiled. The kind that didn't quite reach the eyes.
"I'm just thinking," she said softly.
And she was.
About a wedding dress that didn't feel like hers.
About a man with hands like cages.
And about a story that didn't have to end the way it was written.
Not this time.
Not if she rewrote it herself.
—
Later That Night
The moonlight painted the city in shades of ivory and bruise. Neon signs flickered like dying stars above speakeasies and smoke-choked clubs. Somewhere, Louis Armstrong played on a radio, and for a second, it felt like the world might still be beautiful.
Rosalie Hale didn't believe it.
Not anymore.
She walked with a grace she didn't feel, arms folded tightly over her chest, the ghost of a smile long since erased. The scent of Vera's cookies still clung to her like a memory she wasn't ready to let go. She could still feel the little boy's fingers grasping at her curls, soft and trusting.
It should have been enough.
But the closer she got to Royce's building, the more the illusion cracked.
And then—laughter.
Raucous. Slurred. Ugly.
She turned the corner and froze.
Royce stood beneath the gaslight like some devil in a cologne ad—hair mussed, shirt untucked, silk tie hanging loose around his neck. He looked like he'd fallen out of a jazz poster and into a gutter.
His smirk belonged in a boardroom. But here, it curled in something darker. Primal.
"Rosie!" he bellowed, arms open like he expected applause.
Behind him, his cronies howled—stocky, slack-jawed boys in stolen suits with gin-slick voices.
"Come 'ere, sweetheart," Royce cooed, stumbling toward her. "Told the boys you were a real stunner. C'mon, give us a little spin, huh?"
Rosalie blinked, icy and still.
"You're drunk," she said coolly. "And disgusting. Let's go home."
Royce's smile curdled.
"Did she just—?" one of his friends started.
"I think she just turned me down," Royce said, his voice silk-wrapped steel. "That's adorable."
Rosalie pivoted. Her heels clicked like a pistol being cocked.
And then—
A hand. On her wrist.
Too tight. Too familiar.
She whirled. "Let. Go."
Royce leaned in. The stink of whiskey and arrogance burned her nose.
"You forget who you belong to?" he growled. "You don't walk away from me."
"You don't own me."
"Rosie," he said, teeth bared. "Everything about you says I do."
Then—crack. Her shoulder popped as he yanked her forward.
"Royce—"
"You walk away again, I'll drag you home," he snarled.
She slapped him.
The alley went silent.
Even the city seemed to hold its breath.
Then his eyes darkened—stormclouds boiling behind blue.
"You shouldn't have done that."
He shoved her. She stumbled, caught herself. Her hands were shaking now—but she didn't cry.
"Royce, please," she said. "I don't want—"
"Don't care."
He grabbed her hair, yanking out pins that caught the light like shattered glass. Her scalp stung. Warmth trickled down her temple.
The others hesitated.
"Royce, man…" one said nervously.
"She's your fiancée, for God's sake," the other muttered.
Royce never looked away from her.
"She's mine," he said. "She'll do what I say."
He pushed her into the alley.
The darkness swallowed them whole.
Rosalie screamed. Nails clawed. Elbows struck. Her voice cracked the air—but no one came.
No one ever came.
Fabric tore. Laughter twisted into panting. Grunts. Fists.
The pain bloomed—crimson and final.
And then—
Silence.
—
Sometime Later
Rain fell soft as whispered apologies.
Rosalie lay broken. Her skin was a canvas of bruises and blood. Her dress hung from her like tattered silk on a marionette with no strings.
Everything hurt.
Her breath was wet with blood. Her eyes barely opened. The world swam in and out of focus like a dream gone wrong.
Footsteps.
Not heavy. Not hurried.
Measured. Calm.
She wanted to scream—but she couldn't move. Couldn't fight. Couldn't breathe.
The man who knelt beside her didn't smell like whiskey or smoke. He smelled like... cedarwood. Clean linen. Snow in spring.
He had golden hair, swept back like a king in an old Norse myth. His face was elegant, angular. His eyes—warm gold—looked at her like she was someone.
Not a body. Not a toy. Not a thing.
"Easy," he murmured, kneeling into the pool of blood without hesitation. "You're safe now."
She tried to speak. Coughed.
He lifted her carefully, like she might shatter.
Her voice was a breath. "Am I... dying?"
He looked at her. Then gently brushed blood from her cheek with a thumb.
"No," he said softly. "Not if I can help it."
She blinked, tears mixing with rain. "Who... are you?"
"Carlisle," he said. "Dr. Cullen. But you can just call me the idiot who couldn't get here fast enough."
A hint of a smile touched his lips—sad and furious all at once.
She looked up at him—this stranger, this angel, this impossible thing—and whispered, "Are you real?"
He chuckled once. "Not in the way you think."
Then, more gently: "I'm going to ask you something impossible, Rosalie Hale. I'm going to ask you to let go... just for a moment. Let me take the pain."
She hesitated. Barely.
Then she nodded.
He bent his head, and teeth like ivory slid into her throat.
It should have hurt.
But it didn't.
It felt like a flame replacing ice.
A kind of peace she hadn't known in years.
Her last breath was a whisper: "Don't let them... get away with it."
Carlisle lifted his head, mouth stained red.
His voice, when he spoke, rang like judgement.
"They won't."
—
Three Days Later. Cullen Estate, outskirts of Rochester
The storm had passed.
Rain no longer fell. Snow no longer melted.
And Rosalie Hale no longer bled.
Her eyes snapped open—burning crimson, pupils dilating as the world bloomed into savage color. Sound struck like thunder: the hum of electricity in the walls, a mouse chewing insulation beneath the floorboards, the frantic heartbeats of creatures scurrying in the distant forest.
Everything was too much.
She sat up. Her body responded not with fatigue, but grace—a predator in silk. Her skin no longer felt like skin. It shimmered like starlight. The dress she wore was no longer the bloodied, torn thing from the alley. It was silver and soft and made to cling to the architecture of her new form.
The house whispered beneath her bare feet as she moved. Slow. Controlled. Changed.
Her heart didn't beat. But pain still echoed in the hollow chamber where it used to be.
And rage. Oh, the rage survived.
She stepped onto the mezzanine that overlooked the sitting room below, her eyes catching on the players of her strange new pantomime.
Carlisle stood in the center—tall, immaculate, his golden hair catching firelight like a halo, but his eyes were anything but divine. Sharp. Determined. Troubled. Like a Viking pretending to be a priest.
Esme was close to him, her expression painted in soft strokes of grief and gentleness, arms crossed over a lavender blouse that didn't hide the tension in her shoulders.
Edward paced like a caged animal—his silhouette knife-like in the fireplace's flicker. Every step was restless. Every breath too short. The definition of eternal adolescence in torment.
Daenerys lounged across a Victorian fainting couch like a queen exiled from her throne, legs crossed with calculated elegance. Her platinum curls spilled like mercury across her shoulder. She watched everything—and nothing—with a distinct detachment, like she'd already set this room on fire in her mind and was only debating whether it was worth the mess.
And then—
Hadrian.
Leaning by the window, one hand tucked into the pocket of his charcoal coat, the other resting on his hip. His emerald eyes were unreadable under dark lashes, but Rosalie felt them—like green fire against her skin.
Gods. He was still devastating.
There was iron in his jaw, thunder in the lines of his shoulders. And though he hadn't looked at her yet, she knew: he felt her.
He always had.
Even when she was Royce's trophy, wrapped in lace and lies. Even when Daenerys had his heart in her hand like something carved from starlight.
Rosalie had always been watching Hadrian.
And she hated that he'd never watched her back.
"You changed her," Edward said, voice low and furious, dragging her attention back to the floor below. "Without her consent."
Carlisle didn't flinch. "I saved her."
"You damned her."
"She was brutalized. Left for dead. Would you have me bury her like an animal in the street?"
"She didn't choose this!" Edward shouted, spinning on his heel, his voice echoing through the grand room like a slap.
Esme's voice cut in like balm. "She couldn't have answered. Not in that state."
"And you think she should've died?" Hadrian asked, finally speaking. His voice was calm. Controlled. But behind it was stormcloud steel. "You think death was the more ethical option?"
Edward turned to him. "Don't you start moralizing like you're above this."
"I'm not," Hadrian said, meeting his gaze. "But I'm honest about it."
Rosalie stepped forward.
"Fascinating," she said, her voice sugar-laced poison. "Everyone's so deeply invested in the ethics of my survival. And yet—not one of you thought to ask what I want."
Silence detonated across the room.
All eyes turned. Even Hadrian.
Finally.
She descended the staircase like it was a throne room, each step silent and intentional. A goddess born of violence and vengeance, clothed in silk and fury. The firelight kissed her hair. Her crimson gaze raked across every face like a scalpel.
Carlisle moved forward, hesitating. "Rosalie. You're—"
"Awake?" she finished. "No, Carlisle. I'm awake, aware, and alive."
Edward's jaw clenched.
She turned to him, slow as a blade being drawn. "Let me guess. You're disappointed. Thought Carlisle was handing you your forever-girlfriend. Only now that I don't smile like a debutante in a perfume ad, I'm... what? Damaged goods?"
"That's not—" Edward started, stiffening.
Rosalie stepped closer. Her eyes bore into him. "You're repulsed. I can smell it on you. You look at me like I'm some cracked mirror you've been forced to keep in your house out of guilt."
He looked away.
"Exactly," she hissed.
She turned to Daenerys. "You, at least, look at me like I'm still human."
Daenerys tilted her head, her eyes amused. "That's because I know monsters when I see them. And you're not one."
"Not yet," Rosalie said. But there was the ghost of a smile.
Hadrian's voice was a velvet knife. "Not what I expected."
She looked at him. "No?"
"You're stronger than I thought," he said, emerald eyes unreadable. "More fire than glass."
Rosalie's mouth parted. Not a compliment. Not exactly. But something in her cracked open at the honesty.
She turned her back on him, if only to keep herself from folding.
"I'm not here for your judgment. I'm not here for your absolution. Royce King and his friends did this to me. And they're still breathing."
Carlisle moved forward. "Rosalie—revenge won't bring you peace."
"No," she said, staring out the window. "But it'll bring me closure."
Hadrian stepped forward. "Justice isn't about blood."
She glanced back. "You say that like you haven't spilled oceans of it."
He didn't deny it.
Daenerys stood, heels clicking on the hardwood, dress whispering around her legs. "If she's going, she doesn't go alone."
Rosalie arched an eyebrow. "Why?"
Daenerys shrugged. "Because sisterhood is forged in fire. And because I know what it is to want the world to bleed for what it did to you."
Rosalie stared at her. "You don't even like me."
Daenerys grinned. "Who said I had to?"
Rosalie laughed—once, short and sharp.
Carlisle sighed. "Then let it be truth. Let it be mercy. Let it be for the girl they left behind."
Rosalie turned, eyes gleaming. "Oh, Doctor."
She stepped into the firelight.
"I buried that girl three days ago."
And the fire in her blood was only just beginning to burn.
—
One Month Later
Rochester. The King Estate. Private Vault Room.
Royce King wasn't sleeping. Hadn't in days. Couldn't.
Sleep brought dreams. Dreams brought her. And she brought the screaming.
He sat curled in a leather chair too expensive to bleed on, eyes darting like rats in a trap. The vault room reeked of stale sweat and cigar smoke, layered over the sickly sweetness of fear. Golden curls plastered to his skull like wilted laurels, cheeks hollowed out like the glamour-boy masks he'd worn at Harvard. Eyes bloodshot, twitching. He looked less like the golden prince of Rochester and more like a drunk cherub that fell into the fire and stayed there.
The vault was old-world fortification: two-foot-thick steel door bolted with mechanical locks, surrounded by concrete walls and a crank-operated bolt system built during the Great War. You needed two keys, two men, and a priest to get in. Or so the architect claimed.
But Royce King had seen what they did to Allen and Trevor.
Allen, crucified on the hood of his cherry-red Cadillac. Not tied. Not nailed. Flayed. His skin hung in delicate ribbons, fluttering in the wind like a parade of sins. Trevor, found floating in his pool — smiling. Not with lips, but with exposed teeth. Jaw skinned clean. No blood. Just bone and chlorine.
The police said it was ritualistic. Royce knew better.
It was a reckoning. And it was personal.
And then…
The screaming started.
It came from upstairs. Brief. Too brief. A wet pop. A thud. Silence.
Then the boom.
Not a knock. Not a creak. The door exploded.
A wall of smoke rolled in like theater fog. A halo of fire danced along the ruins of the steel frame.
Royce scrambled backward on the marble floor, heels sliding like a beetle flipped on its back. "No—no no no—God—Jesus—"
Sparks hissed from the broken light fixtures. The overhead lamp swung violently, casting shadows that warped across the walls like devils dancing.
And then...
She appeared.
Rosalie.
Not walked. Floated.
Smoke curled around her like she commanded it, her figure framed in ivory silk that shimmered with moonlight and menace. A wedding dress. Elegant, antique, stitched from trauma. Her golden hair fell in soft waves, cascading down her shoulders like an angel who learned how to sin.
Her eyes glowed like rubies dipped in snowmelt.
"Evenin', darling," she said sweetly, her voice like sugar poured over broken glass. "Miss me?"
—
Behind her came Daenerys.
No, not came. Glided.
Pale blue chiffon clung to her frame like whispered prophecy. A white rose bloomed behind her ear, her silver-gold hair coiled and flowing like moonlight over silk. She looked like Aphrodite and Vengeance had a child during a war.
Her violet eyes swept over the room, slow and surgical.
"This was subtle," she noted, eyeing the flaming wreckage of the vault door.
"I'm a vampire in a wedding dress," Rosalie said without looking back. "I'm done being subtle."
—
And then, the air changed.
He stepped through the smoke like it owed him money.
Hadrian Peverell.
Six-foot-three of carved menace in a black wool overcoat, boots clicking softly on marble. His emerald green eyes cut through the smoke like a guillotine through velvet. His features, regal and sharp, looked painted by Caravaggio — the kind of face that broke hearts and kingdoms.
His hand rested on Daenerys' waist like he'd earned it in war.
She leaned into his touch, her lips brushing his ear.
"Do you think he's peed himself yet?"
Hadrian glanced at Royce, gave a bored blink. "Odds are better than him surviving the next hour."
Daenerys purred, "You always say the most romantic things."
"You like it."
"I love it."
—
Royce tried to crawl backwards. "This isn't real—you're dead. I killed you. I left you in that field like the filthy little whore you were!"
Rosalie didn't flinch. She smiled. The kind of smile that should come with a thunderclap.
She crossed the room in an instant — a blur of ivory and vengeance. She crouched, her dress spreading around her like a bloodless crime scene.
"You did."
Her voice was soft. Dreamlike.
"You tore my dress," she said, brushing the hem of her new gown with gentle fingers. "Ripped the lace. Broke the zipper. Stained the fabric."
Her eyes never left his.
"Said no one would believe me. Said I was just a dumb blonde with big tits and a pretty face."
She tilted her head.
"So I had another made. This one's for you."
Royce bolted.
Hadrian didn't move.
He just raised one hand.
Royce froze mid-stride. Mid-scream. Every muscle turned to stone. Only his eyes twitched, wide and wet and wild.
Daenerys strutted past him with the quiet confidence of a woman born to rule, and perched delicately on a scorched oak desk, legs crossed, hands folded.
She arched a brow at Rosalie.
"You know, when Hadrian told me what the plan was, but I didn't expect such... flair."
"Oh honey," Rosalie cooed, unbuttoning one long satin glove. "You should've seen me at prom."
"Do you want a turn?"
"Mmm. Later. I want to savor this."
And she did.
—
Hours passed.
She didn't bite. Didn't draw blood. She didn't need to.
She broke everything else.
A finger. A thumb. The wrist. Then the elbow. Slowly. Intimately. Between each crack, she whispered names. The names of girls. The ones no one believed. The ones Royce laughed about at his poker nights. The ones who cried in silence.
Daenerys didn't speak. She just watched. Frostfire burned in her eyes.
She had lived her own version of this story.
Her silence was permission.
Hadrian stood beside her. Still. Quiet. Like a sword waiting to be unsheathed.
At the end, Royce couldn't scream. His jaw hung limp. His eyes rolled in their sockets.
Rosalie crouched beside him again.
Her dress? Spotless. Her lipstick? Perfect. Her smile? Final.
"I'm not going to drink you," she whispered, voice like a lover's lullaby.
"I don't want anything of you inside me. Not even your blood."
She kissed his cheek.
Then, without fanfare, without drama—
She crushed his heart.
One hand. One motion. No mess.
Just the sound of a last, broken beat.
—
They walked out together as the sun rose, the estate a burning silhouette behind them.
Rosalie barefoot, silk dragging behind her like the shroud of a murdered bride. Hadrian's coat billowed like a shadow with purpose. Daenerys's smile was sharp enough to draw blood from the wind.
"That was…" Daenerys began, brushing ash off her skirt. "…intense."
"Next time," Hadrian murmured, "we bring snacks."
She laughed, slipping her hand into his. "I wish we could eat. I've always wondered what popcorn or marshmallows taste like."
"Oh, but that was cathartic," she added, glancing at Rosalie. "That dress is a moment."
Rosalie didn't look back.
"He said I was a ghost," she murmured.
Hadrian looked at her.
"He was wrong."
"No," she said, soft and smiling now. "He was right."
She looked ahead.
"Ghosts don't haunt the past," she said. "We bury it."
And they walked into the morning like they owned it.
Because they did.
---
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