Entangled with the Mafia Don novel Chapter 54

Ezra's POV:

The heavy doors of my office had clicked shut behind me that night, a sound that sealed her in, and, I realized now, sealed me out. In the days, weeks, that followed, the silence from Davina was a colder, more potent weapon than any scream. She was back in the penthouse, under my watchful eye, ostensibly safe. But safe from me? That was the question that clawed at me, day and night.

She moved through the vast, opulent spaces like a ghost. Her initial terror had solidified into a chilling, unwavering resolve. She kept herself meticulously out of my reach. When I was in the living areas, she was in the library or the assigned office space I'd had set up for her. When I went to the gym, she would be gone, presumably in her room. Meals were a silent, agonizing ballet of avoidance. Her eyes, when they met mine, were devoid of the fire, the anger, the warmth that had once burned there. Now, there was only a stark, blank wall, or a flicker of revulsion she quickly masked.

She was focused solely on the debt. Every conversation, every interaction, no matter how brief, circled back to it. "What's the next step? How much more? When can I begin the next task?" Her voice was flat, efficient, like a robot programmed for one purpose: escape. She was trying to repay the debt and nothing more. She wanted nothing else from me, nothing else from this life I had dragged her into.

And it broke me. Each clipped word, each averted glance, each stiff, deliberate movement designed to avoid physical contact – it was a constant, grinding ache in my chest. She was alive, healthy, here, but she was a million miles away, locked behind a barrier of trauma and disgust that I had erected with my own hands. I felt the fissure widen between us with every passing hour. My jaw was perpetually clenched, my fists often unconsciously tightened. I wanted to roar, to demand, to beg her to look at me, to see beyond that single, horrifying moment. But I couldn't. I wouldn't. The mask I wore was too deeply ingrained. My face remained impassive, my voice calm, my control absolute. No one, not even Andrea, saw the splintering beneath my surface.

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