Under Contract with the Alpha

. The house didn't change, just like Dominic . And there I was, a little more lost every moment. Nothi

in a mist, a veil that erased everything around me. I was alone, again, in this room that was too big. Everything was clean, too clean, even the sheet

metown, came to mind, but here there was no echo of that kind of tranquility. The absence of noise surrounded me, reminding me that I was no longer at h

eed. Or maybe it was the need to understand, to unravel this secret heavy like a shadow, the one that had brought me into

attracted me, like a book whose cover you cannot tear off. I searched aimlessly, scanning the shelves until my fingers landed on a thick file, hidden among do

e changed. I found letters, incident reports, court records. And then names. Names I vaguely recognized, names I would

had heard the name in whispers, in hushed conversations, but I never knew it was part of his story. These papers revealed past violence

e carried, one he never spoke of. And I understood better why everything around him was mad

prank that I hadn't asked for. Every sentence I read brought me back to a truth that I didn't want to accept. Dominic had been s

I turned around abruptly and there he was, in the doorway, his dark eyes staring at the papers in my hands. No words wer

Dominic . He was...vulnerable in a way I never thought possible. A flash of pain crossed his eyes, a

ered, his voice strangely calm, as if he

hy did you hide this from me, Dominic ? Why did you

use you wouldn't have understood," he said, his tone harsher now, but there was still that crack, that stirring of truth

stifies everything, that it justifies manipulating me, b

iately. Then he let out a joyless laugh, a short, dry laugh, like a

nt, had been well buried. But she wasn't there for me to heal, not for

ng was broken between us, something that I could no longer repair. There was no longer any room for naivety. I wasn't in a fairy

. Papers were scattered across the desk, but nothing changed. I knew now that I couldn't go back. This truth had change

that the shadow of his past would encompass me sooner or late