Chapter 3
Elle POV
The greenhouse sat at the far edge of the estate, separated from the main grounds by a stretch of overgrown garden that looked like it hadn't seen maintenance in years. Ivy crawled up the glass walls, and several panes were cracked or missing entirely, letting in the night air along with the sound of crickets and distant traffic from the highway. Inside, the space had transformed into something between botanical garden and ruin, with plants growing in wild profusion wherever they could find purchase. Moonlight filtered through the vine-covered roof, turning everything silver and strange.
Adrian held the door for me, then followed me into the humid interior. The air smelled of earth and decomposition and green growing things, so different from the sterile perfection of the main house that I felt something in my chest loosen slightly. He moved through the space with the confidence of someone who'd been here before, navigating around overgrown ferns and hanging moss until he reached a workbench near the back wall. From underneath, he produced a clean glass and a bottle of spring water, which he poured with the same careful attention I imagined he brought to surgical procedures.
"Drink," he said, offering me the glass.
My hands shook as I took it, and water sloshed over the rim, leaving dark spots on my dress. I drank anyway, suddenly aware of how dry my throat had become, how the numbness was beginning to crack around the edges and let something more painful seep through. Adrian watched me with the clinical detachment of a doctor monitoring a patient's vitals, but he made no move to touch me, ask questions, or offer platitudes. He simply stood three steps away and waited.
I finished the water and set the glass down on the workbench, my fingers reluctant to release it because at least holding something gave me a purpose. "Why did you bring me here?"
"Because you looked like you needed to be somewhere that wasn't there." He gestured vaguely in the direction of the main house. "And because this is the only place on the estate where people leave me alone."
"Your mother's greenhouse," I said, remembering something Dominic had mentioned once in passing, back when he still bothered to share family history with me. "She grew orchids."
"She tried to." Adrian's gaze drifted to the wild tangle of plants around us. "Most of them died when she did. The groundskeeper wanted to clear everything out, but my grandfather refused. Said it should stay exactly as she left it." He paused, and something complicated crossed his face. "He's sentimental about the wrong things."
The silence that followed felt different from the oppressive quiet of the dining room. Here, it was almost comfortable, broken only by the rustle of leaves and the distant sound of wind through broken glass. I found myself studying Adrian's profile in the moonlight, noticing details I'd never paid attention to before: the precise line of his jaw, the way his dark hair fell slightly too long over his collar, the thin scar that traced from his right eyebrow into his hairline. He stood with his hands in his pockets, looking at nothing in particular, and I realized that his stillness wasn't indifference but rather a kind of disciplined restraint, as if he'd trained himself not to reach out even when every instinct told him to.
"I saw him," I said, surprising myself with the admission. "Dominic. With someone else."
Adrian's expression didn't change, but something shifted in the set of his shoulders. "I know."
"You know?"
"I suspected." His voice was quiet, matter-of-fact. "My young brother has never been particularly discreet about his priorities."
The casual way he acknowledged it—the infidelity, the cruelty, the calculated indifference—made something inside me crack further. "And you didn't think to warn me?"
"Would you have believed me?" He turned to face me fully, and in the dim light his eyes looked darker, more green than gray. "You would have thought I was interfering, or that I had some ulterior motive. People don't accept warnings about the things they want to be true."
He was right, and I hated him for it. But I also understood, with sudden clarity, that he'd been watching this unfold with the helpless frustration of someone who sees a car accident happening in slow motion and knows there's nothing he can do to stop it. The realization made me feel exposed in a way that had nothing to do with the dress I was wearing or the tears I was trying not to shed.
"Why did you help me tonight?" The question came out smaller than I'd intended.
Adrian was quiet for a long moment, his gaze moving from my face to some point over my shoulder. When he finally spoke, his voice carried a weight I hadn't heard before. "Because someone should have helped her. My mother. When she needed it." He looked back at me, and this time I saw past the professional distance to something raw underneath. "And because you deserve better than what my family does to people."
The simple honesty of it broke something in me that I'd been holding together through sheer force of will. My eyes burned, my throat closed, and I turned away before he could see me fall apart. But I couldn't hide the way my shoulders shook, or the small sound that escaped despite my best efforts to contain it.
I heard Adrian move, felt the air shift as he stepped closer, but he didn't touch me. Instead, his voice came from just behind my left shoulder, quiet and steady. "You don't owe anyone an explanation for what you're feeling. Not tonight. Not ever."
Those words, delivered with such certainty, undid me completely. I pressed my palms against my eyes and let myself cry in a way I hadn't allowed since my father's funeral, when I'd learned that grief was a luxury we couldn't afford and control was the only currency that mattered. Adrian stayed exactly where he was, close enough that I could feel his presence like a physical thing but maintaining that careful distance, and somehow that restraint was more comforting than any embrace could have been.
When I finally stopped shaking, when the tears had run their course and left me hollow and exhausted, I lowered my hands and found him still standing in the same spot. He'd removed his glasses at some point, and without them his face looked younger, more vulnerable. Our eyes met, and something passed between us that I didn't have words for—recognition, maybe, or the beginning of understanding that we were both trapped in this family in different ways.
"I should take you home," he said quietly.
I nodded, not trusting my voice, and followed him back through the greenhouse toward the parking area behind the main house.
