Without another moment, he straightened, flicked the cigarette aside, got into his car, and drove off.
I stood there, watching his taillights fade past the estate wall and into the darkness until they disappeared completely.
To my surprise, something inside me shifted, just slightly, like a quiet ripple beneath still water.
By the time Dante finally came home, the sky had already begun to pale with the first hint of dawn.
The moment he stepped through the door, his expression twisted into a frown. His nose wrinkled in obvious displeasure.
"Adriana, can you try acting like a decent woman for once?" he snapped without preamble. "You stink of smoke. It's disgusting. Quit that habit."
He had always hated it when I smoked.
But I hadn't always been like this. I only picked it up after we were bound together, after the warmth between us had faded into silence, into cold indifference, into a life that felt more like routine than anything real. Days blurred into each other. Conversations became scarce. I needed something, anything, to break through that suffocating stillness.
Even if it was just the sharp burn of nicotine in my lungs.