Gilded Cage

CASSIA

Time passed, slow and heavy, the kind that stretches and blurs until it loses meaning. I lay there staring at the ceiling, listening to the quiet hum of the mansion, waiting for the door to open, waiting for his footsteps, waiting for Dante to come back so we could talk, so we could fix whatever had cracked between us.

But he didn't.

Minutes turned into an hour. Maybe more. My mind stayed t