Hope you don’t mind a mess.

Cassidy's POV

The first morning in the Ashford mansion felt like waking up in someone else’s skin.

I opened my eyes to delicate sunlight slanting through silk curtains, the rays scattering across the cream-colored walls and gilded crown molding. For a moment, I forgot where I was—midway through a dream where home still meant a squeaky twin bed, mismatched blankets, and the low drone of city sounds rolling through a cracked window. Then the chandelier caught a sliver of sunlight, scattering diamonds across the ceiling, and reality—all sharp angles and cold beauty—flooded back in.

I lay there, motionless, blankets tangled around my legs. Expensive sheets—Egyptian cotton, probably—felt alien against my skin. I pressed my palms to the pillow, fighting the urge to hug it to my chest and squeeze until it became something familiar. But I already knew that nothing in this house would ever belong to me.

As I hauled myself up, the enormity of everything pressed down: my mother’s uncontainable joy at marrying rich, the snap of my old life shattering beneath everything I’d lost, and the knowledge—clear as glass—that I didn’t fit here. Not in this room, not in this house, not at all.

I pulled on a clean t-shirt and the least-ripped pair of jeans I owned, finger-combed my hair into a loose braid, and forced myself downstairs.

The mansion’s hallways were wide enough to echo every footstep a hundred times. I passed oil paintings—portraits of grim men and radiant women, their gazes following me with silent judgment. My fingers itched to trail the bannister, just to feel anchored, but I kept my hands in my pockets. I moved quietly, trying to be invisible.

When I entered the dining hall, the air changed.

The table was a leviathan, easily seating twenty, laid with a white damask cloth. Sunlight poured through windows as tall as two people, illuminating silver breakfast platters arranged with mathematical precision. There were eggs in molded domes, fruit sliced to perfect crescents, glass pitchers of juice sweating beads of condensation. Everything looked like it belonged in the kind of glossy magazine I'd flip through in a doctor’s waiting room, just to feel for a second that I could taste a different life.

At the far end, my mother was laughing at something Richard said. She glowed—her cheeks flushed, hair curled soft around her shoulders, hands tucked primly in her lap. She glanced up as I entered, and her face shifted briefly. She patted the seat beside her, her eyes pleading, so I crossed the room and slid into a chair.

“Did you sleep well, honey?” she asked, her voice gentle and forced at the same time.

“For the most part.” I lied. “It’s just…really quiet here.”

Richard—my new stepfather, though I still struggled to use the word—looked amused. “You’ll grow used to it,” he assured me. “We like our peace and order here.”

I bit my tongue. Peace and order and rules I didn’t know.

A few moments later, a pair of staff members—one young, the other older, both neat as pins—appeared beside me to refill my cup, set a dish in front of me, tuck in the chair. I jumped at their sudden presence, and one of them, the younger maid, gave me a gentle, apologetic smile.

“Thank you,” I murmured.

She nodded and faded back into the background—barely there, invisible.

I was halfway through stirring sugar into my coffee, trying not to look overwhelmed, when the air in the room changed again.

I felt him before I saw him. The shift was subtle—a ripple that pulsed down the table, quiet yet complete. The click of expensive shoes against marble. The weight of everyone’s attention pivoting like iron filings drawn by a magnet. I kept my eyes down, but my skin prickled.

Dante Ashford strode into the breakfast room like he’d conjured it out of thin air for his own amusement. He was freshly showered, dark hair still damp, swept back from his face. His crisp white shirt was artlessly unbuttoned at the collar and tucked into navy slacks that probably cost more than my rent for a year. Without a word, he paused at the side table, selected a glass of orange juice, and poured himself a drink, his movements measured—elegant, almost lazy.

“Morning, son,” Richard called out. Beside me, my mother straightened, her smile sharpening.

Dante’s gaze swept the room, lingering only a fraction of a second on me. But it was enough. The briefest flicker—a sort of appraisal mixed with something colder. Something that said I was here on borrowed time.

He moved to take the seat directly across from me, settling in with the kind of predatory grace that made me feel pinned, like a rabbit caught in the shadow of a hawk.

He didn’t look at me right away. Instead, he reached for a croissant, breaking it open over his plate with long, deft fingers. Steam curled from the pastry in the chilly morning air. Dante didn’t rush; he sculpted each movement.

“You’re early,” he finally said, voice so smooth it could pass for silk as he buttered his bread with casual precision. “Most… guests take a while to adjust. The first days are overwhelming, I imagine.”

There it was—his first thrust, subtle but unmistakable. Guest. The word landed between us like a dropped knife.

I tried to muster a smile that didn’t tremble. “I’m not a guest,” I replied, forcing the words out steady and quiet. “I live here now.”

His smile was small and polite, but his eyes glinted, like he knew how easily any answer could be twisted. He sipped his juice, then leaned forward, voice carrying just enough to draw the staff’s attention.

“We’ll see how long that lasts.” His tone was gentle, almost kind, but the innuendo cut sharper than any shout.

The older maid paused mid-pour, her hands tightening imperceptibly around the carafe before she moved on. The younger one dropped her gaze to her shoes.

Richard laughed like it was some harmless family joke, oblivious to the knife beneath his son’s words. “Dante has an odd sense of humor, Liana. Pay it no mind,” he said, barely looking up from his phone.

My mother’s smile looked brittle now, as if she’d just bitten down on glass.

For a moment, quiet fell—a heavy, suffocating hush under the glitter of chandeliers and the clink of silver. I focused on the fruit salad, stabbing a grape with my fork, willing myself to ignore the tremor in my hand.

But Dante wasn’t finished.

He reached across the table, plucking an extra napkin as if considering its quality. He examined it, then, as if by accident, knocked over his glass. Juice spilled across the pristine tablecloth, staining it orange in a widening circle.

“Oh,” Dante drawled, feigning surprise as the staff rushed forward with cloths and concerned murmurs. “Apologies. Clumsy me.”

He turned to me, his blue eyes icy. “Hope you don’t mind a mess, Liana. I hear some people are quite… accustomed to it.”

My face flamed. I wanted to disappear. I recognized the tactic—charm for the adults, poison for the target. “It’s fine,” I said, forcing a steady voice. “You can always clean it up.”