Georgia's POV
One evening, as I brush my hair, watching light tangle itself in each golden strand, Josiah's voice severs my reverie.
"You've been quiet lately."
I freeze momentarily, the bristles of the brush ensnared between my fingers, then resume the motion with mechanical precision.
"Have I?"
Josiah undresses with the same clinical efficiency he applies to everything.
Expensive fabric surrendering with soft sighs, shoes meeting carpet with muffled thuds.
He never truly sees me. He acquired me, and now I'm simply his.
Maintained and occasionally displayed like a rare automobile, a trophy to polish and showcase.
"Mm. You've seemed... distant."
He's distracted by something, probably his email or a business transaction.
I meet his gaze in the mirror, careful.
Georgia, be careful. Don't give yourself away.
"I suppose I've been tired."
Not entirely a lie. My thoughts exhaust me.
My body feels leaden, as if gravity recalibrated itself around me alone, pressing me deeper into earth that refuses to swallow me.
Josiah hums, interest already evaporating as he loosens his tie.
"Perhaps I should plan something for us. A small getaway."
The suggestion crystallizes dread in my stomach.
Not because I don't crave escape, but because I know it will alter nothing.
Josiah could fly me anywhere, drape me in constellations of diamonds, spirit me to the most exotic locales, and I would still feel this void expanding inside me.
This barren crater I've only just recognized.
I set down my brush, forcing a smile that feels like rigor mortis.
"That sounds lovely."
"Of course, it will have to wait. Business before pleasure. I have that two-week trip coming up. After that, we'll plan something."
Josiah kisses my cheek. Perfunctory, barely there.
Leaving the faint ghost of scotch and stale cologne.
He extinguishes the light, plunging us into darkness pierced only by pale moonlight seeping through parted curtains.
As he settles into bed, I remain seated, staring at my reflection in the ambient city glow.
Shadows excavate my cheekbones, carve chasms beneath my eyes.
The face that stares back is a stranger's. Beautiful, yes, but vacant. Curated.
I don't recognize the woman staring back.
Worse, I wonder if I ever have.
The realization lodges in my chest like shrapnel.
I press my fingertips to my lips, half-expecting numbness, surprised to find them warm and trembling.
A sharp ache blossoms inside. Not for Carlisle himself, but for what he symbolizes.
For the possibility that beyond my gilded cage exists a universe I willingly forsook.
Behind me, Josiah's breathing deepens into slumber.
I remain still, listening to the night's soliloquy.
A car's distant lament. The grandfather clock's patient countdown. Wind whispering secrets through the trees.
And beneath it all, a new sound.
The faint but unmistakable fracturing of ice as something long-frozen inside me begins, ever so slightly, to thaw.
-----
Birds perform their dawn aria outside the half-open window, their jubilant notes mocking the silence between us.
Josiah travels for business. Always has.
"Empire maintenance," he calls it, a phrase that once seemed so sensible, so inevitable.
I stopped questioning years ago, his departures and returns as predictable as our Tuesday gardener who sculpts our hedges into perfect geometric prisoners.
But this time is different.
This time, I count down to his absence with a secret thrill that scares the shit out of me.
Morning light slices across our breakfast nook, throwing knife-edge shadows over marble countertops.
Coffee steam spirals upward like prayers, mingling with the scent of pale pink roses I arranged yesterday in crystal.
Outside, sprinklers hiss money onto our perfect lawn.
"This trip requires my full attention."
Josiah flips through his itinerary with those manicured fingers. The expensive paper crackles like burning currency with each turn.
He doesn't look up. Never does.
"New York meetings, then London. Two weeks, give or take."
Two weeks. Fourteen days of freedom.
My pulse quickens. Not from anxiety, but something dangerously close to ecstasy.
I press my fingertips against my coffee cup to hide their treasonous trembling.
"That sounds... busy."
I watch condensation trail down the carafe like a solitary tear.
His gunmetal eyes finally rise to mine, slicing through the atmosphere between us.
His gaze makes me feel as if I'm under inspection. Not a wife, but a specimen to be cataloged and shelved.
The morning light highlights the silver at his temples. Those fifteen extra years between us once seemed distinguished.
Now, they only mark how long he's had to perfect his dominion.
"I assume you'll manage in my absence?"
Not a question. A reminder.
I nod, the motion choreographed from years of finishing school and his "gentle corrections."
Spine straight, chin precisely angled.
"Of course."
His mouth twitches, almost imperceptible, a non-smile I've learned to interpret as approval.
Gold wedding band flashing as he returns to his papers. His world of numbers and meetings.
The sound of a fork against china like a gunshot punctuating the ordinary rhythm of our lives.
The clock ticks in the hall. The soundtrack of my incarceration.
Something restless prowls inside me. A creature suddenly aware of its captivity.
The sensation terrifies me, a fissure in my carefully cultivated anesthesia.
His trips once devastated me. Early in our marriage, I'd count heartbeats until his return.
Now, as he drones on about flight connections and international calls, his rich voice fades to static.
All I feel is anticipation. Not for him, but for the vacuum that will follow.
I haven't realized how asphyxiating his presence has become until I contemplate its absence.
The truth settles over me like a funeral shroud.
"It's unfortunate you'll miss the Wexler event."
My voice is carefully calibrated for the perfect balance of disappointment and understanding.
Josiah barely looks up, lost in the quiet crinkle of paper.
His cologne, sandalwood and cedar that I selected for him, wafts between us like a specter.
"Is it?"
I laugh, the sound hollow, bouncing off the polished walls like a counterfeit.
"Well, I certainly can't imagine attending alone."
The lie feels strange on my tongue.
Weeks ago, it would have been truth. Now? The idea of navigating a room without his proprietary hand at my back feels intoxicating.
It tastes like freedom, like oxygen in chambers I hadn't known existed.
He sighs, the sound clipped, one reserved for unsatisfactory quarterly reports and my occasional transgressions.
A crease deepens between his brows.
"Then don't go. You despise these events anyway."
Despise? No. I've endured them.
Smiled at important people, made forgettable small talk, stood half a step behind Josiah while he commanded rooms.
But all the while, I've been invisible. A reflection of his success rather than a woman in my own right.
Until Carlisle showed me what it felt like to be seen.
The thought of Carlisle sends heat slithering up my neck, creeping across my skin like something forbidden and divine.
I lift my cup higher, using it as a porcelain rampart.
"It's of no importance, Georgia."
Josiah's voice is dismissive, a tap on the table. The percussion of a conversation that's over before it truly began.
"Marcus will finalize my flights. If you need anything, speak to Celeste."
Ah, Celeste. His assistant.
The woman who has become his proxy in so many ways, managing his life with ruthless precision.
Her voice, cold as midwinter over the phone, is always the voice of control.
I sip my coffee, savoring the bitter warmth as my mind wanders to possibilities I haven't dared to consider before.
The weight of them makes my chest constrict with both terror and exhilaration.
Two weeks. Fourteen days.
Sunlight shifts across the room, casting a soft golden glow on everything it touches. Gilding my cage.
Outside, a hummingbird darts between flowers, its wings a blur of violent motion.
I watch it hover, suspended yet free in ways I've long forgotten how to be.
Perhaps, in the absence of Josiah, I might finally remember how to breathe.