ARSHILA — POV
I don't know what I signed up for.
That thought sits heavy in my chest, unmoving, like it knows I'll stop running eventually.
I'm on the balcony.
Bare feet on cold stone. Night air pressing into my skin—salt, wind, distant water. Italy breathes differently after dark. Slower. Like it's watching instead of performing.
The breeze slips under my dress and I let it.
I deserve the cold.
Below me, the city glows softly. Quiet money. Rooftops stacked like secrets. Somewhere down there, people are laughing, drinking, touching—living like nothing cracked open tonight.
Like a man didn't stop being human on marble.
My hands tighten around the railing.
Too tight.
They remember.
That's the problem. My body remembers before my mind is ready to.
The shift in the air.
The sound of impact.
The way violence didn't explode—it arrived.
I close my eyes.
And his are there.
Zayan's.
Dark. Empty. Focused. Not loud. Not emotional. Controlled in the cleanest, most terrifying way.
Like a blade that doesn't shake because it doesn't need to.
That's what won't let me breathe.
Not the blood.
Not the fists.
Not even the man on the floor.
It's the control.
I inhale slowly. Counted. It doesn't help.
Because my head keeps replaying the same moment, over and over—not like panic, but like analysis. Like something inside me is trying to understand a system I didn't know existed.
The room didn't react to him.
It obeyed.
Men like that don't leave rooms quietly. Billionaires don't retreat without noise, without ego, without spectacle.
But they did.
No arguing.
No threats.
No posturing.
They moved.
Like Tavarian wasn't a surname.
Like it was a sentence.
I open my eyes. The night is the same.
I'm not.
Kamal's face intrudes without permission.
That stillness.
That terrifying calm.
He didn't rush. Didn't shout. Didn't look surprised.
He stood there like this moment had already happened once before. Like it had a file.
And then—
"Adam."
The name hits my skull again.
Hard.
Kamal always uses it. Not Zayan. Not heir. Not son.
Adam.
But tonight it didn't sound affectionate.
It sounded like a switch.
I lean my forehead against the cool railing and the memory sharpens whether I want it to or not.
The fist frozen mid-air.
The breath caught.
The exact second he stops being a weapon and becomes a man again.
His shoulders shift. His eyes return.
Like something is dragged out of him by that name alone.
Like Adam is the part that remembers how to exist among people.
My stomach twists.
That isn't instinct.
That's training.
The breeze tangles in my hair, brushes my collarbone, slides over skin like it knows I'm unraveling.
Where is he.
The thought is sharp. Unwanted.
Not concern.
Awareness.
The space behind me feels too large. Too quiet. My body has clocked his absence and doesn't like it.
That scares me more than anything else tonight.
I straighten slowly.
The city stretches endlessly, indifferent and beautiful, uninterested in my collapse.
Fine.
I'm used to handling things alone.
But this—
This isn't a problem.
It's a fault line.
And I'm standing on it, finally seeing what's always been there beneath polish and restraint and soft hands on my pulse.
The man I married didn't change tonight.
He surfaced.
I thought I married a devil in a suit.
Turns out, I married the devil without the suit.
A devil who knows exactly how far his power goes.
He's not a cold-hearted bastard.
That would've been easier.
Cold is manageable. Detached, controlled, playing games behind silence and money—I thought that's who Zayan Tavarian was. A man who fucked with your head and never let you close enough to matter.
What I saw tonight wasn't cold.
It was precise.
A monster in a tailored suit. Hands made to protect, to hold—and instead trained to break. To destroy without hesitation.
I didn't miss it.
I wasn't naïve.
I just didn't know what I was looking at.
I thought I understood him. Thought the heir, the sarcasm, the unreadable silences hid a man fighting himself. A man with pressure. With shadows.
But that wasn't pressure.
That was design.
Adam.
The name that stopped him. The name Kamal used like a command.
Zayan Tavarian is the mask. The name the world worships.
Adam is what lives underneath when the mask shifts.
The guards didn't flinch.
They didn't rush.
They didn't react.
Because this wasn't new.
This was normal.
And that's when it hits me—not like a revelation, but like a bruise finally showing color.
He has two faces.
Not public and private.
Intentional.
Zayan is built for rooms. For money. For strangers who mistake silence for class and restraint for civility. He knows when to speak, when to stand still, when to let his name do the damage.
Adam isn't hidden.
He's leashed.
Not a disorder. Not a crack. The base layer. Instinct and muscle memory and blood logic. A man who knows exactly how much force breaks bone because he's learned it.
Tonight wasn't a snap.
It was a slip.
The mask didn't shatter. It shifted.
And that's worse.
Because it means he's always there—choosing. Managing. Containing.
Kamal didn't raise a grandson.
He built a weapon and taught it manners.
The name proves it.
A reset. A reminder.
Everyone else saw power tonight.
I saw mastery.
Every soft touch replays differently now. Not tenderness—regulation. Every pause before he speaks—calculation. Every step closer followed by restraint—containment.
He isn't afraid of the world.
He's managing himself.
And that knowledge settles heavy in my chest because it changes everything.
Adam Tavarian isn't the monster under the throne.
He is the throne.
Zayan is what sits on it so the world doesn't burn.
And I'm married to the mask—finally understanding that the terrifying part isn't what he's capable of.
It's how deliberately he chooses when to be which version.