Page 100 of In Shadows We Dance

“Or what?” My voice rises. “What happens if I stop following your stupid rules? If I stop hiding? What will you do if I ask why we never use credit cards? Or why you check the locks every night? Or why you’re so afraid of anyone wanting to talk to me?”

“Enough!” His hand slams against the doorframe, the sound making my mom flinch. But it’s not anger I see in his face, it’s fear. Raw and unguarded, just for a moment, before he schools his expression into something harder.

“Go to your room.”

I hold his gaze, refusing to be beaten down. “Maybe I’m tired of being told what to do. Maybe I want to do more than just survive!”

“You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Don’t I?” I turn away, moving toward my room. “Maybe I know more than you want me to.”

I close my bedroom door quietly, resisting the urge to slam it. My whole body is shaking from the adrenaline flooding my system.

I've never talked to him like that. Never challenged him. Never let him see how much I resent the cage he's built around me. Because before now, beforeWren, I didn’t know there was some other way for me to live. Didn’t know what I was missing.

Their voices reach me through the walls—too muffled to make out words, but the tension in their tones is clear. Mom's higher pitch, worried. Dad's deeper rumble, angry. Or scared.

What are you afraid of, Dad? What's really out there?

I pull the dress out of my bag and lay it across the bed. The blue silk glistens in the light. I can still feel it against my skin.

Wren's voice echoes in my head again.

Your parents kept secrets.

A soft knock at my door makes me jump.

"Ileana?" Mom's voice, hesitant. "Can we talk?"

"I'm tired." The words come out harder than I intend. "I just want to go to bed."

A pause. "Your father ... he just wants to protect you."

"From what?"

The silence goes on for so long I think she's left. Then, so quietly I almost miss it, she speaks. "Some questions are dangerous."

My heart pounds against my ribs. "More dangerous than not knowing the answers?"

She doesn't respond. Her footsteps fade away, leaving me with more questions than ever.

I pull out my dance notebook, but the pages blur before my eyes. Every movement I've ever choreographed now looks like evidence of a rebellion I didn’t know I was committing. Each step, each turn, a tiny act of defiance against my father's rules.

The curtains at my window shift in the breeze and I freeze, anticipation filling my veins.

Is he out there? Watching? Waiting for me?

The thought used to terrify me. Now, it makes me feel hot and needy.

Tomorrow, he said.Come to me tomorrow.

But tomorrow feels too far away. The walls of my small bedroom press in, suffocating me. My father's anger, my mother's warning. They push me toward a decision that would have been unthinkable this morning.

My eyes fall on the blue dress spread across my bed. The dresshechose. The dress I wanted but never would have dared to buy for myself. It represents everything my father warned me against—being noticed, being wanted, being seen.

Maybe that's exactly why I need to wear it.

CHAPTER 52

---