His Silent Screams

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The scarlet, ridiculously expensive red wine dripped from my hair, splattering onto the custom-made rug like a violent execution.

Julian gripped the empty glass, looking down at me with cold arrogance. Lapdog.

I braced myself to tear him apart, but a sudden, desperate voice echoed in my head.

[ What the fuck is this bullshit system?! ]

My head snapped up. Julian's lips were pressed into a tight, hard line. Yet the voice continued to scream inside my skull.

[ I am such a piece of shit! Sutton, baby, please don't take this! See that bottle of vodka right next to your hand? Throw it back! Splash it right in my fucking face! ]

Chapter 1

The VIP room was drenched in dim, pulsing light. Julian kept his eyes half-lowered, his hand still suspended in the exact position from throwing the wine. Annoyance hardened his jawline. I grabbed a napkin and wiped my face.

Beside Julian, a girl in a revealing designer dress clung to his arm like a parasite vine. "Julian," she mocked, her voice dripping with sugary poison, "wasting such an expensive vintage on her is a complete tragedy."

He let out a low, mocking laugh. "Ms. Sutton is high society. Ordinary liquor doesn't match her net worth."

The heavy bass in the room cut out. Suffocating silence rushed in.

His brow furrowed. "Who killed the track? Keep drinking."

Julian sank back into the leather sofa, drumming his fingers against the backrest. He tilted his chin toward me. "Pour the wine."

I stared at his long fingers, feeling the greedy stares of everyone around us waiting for a show. I could hear their suppressed breaths. Everyone was watching for my reaction.

As the heiress sitting at the absolute top of this country's wealth pyramid, I was used to crushing people's dignity beneath my heels. When it came to arrogance, no one dared to challenge me.

After a few seconds of dead silence, I stepped forward, grabbed the bottle, leaned over, and poured his drink.

Julian shot me a look. A flicker of surprise at my obedience crossed his eyes. "Pour for the rest of them."

I did exactly as told. But the guys I served practically shrank back, their hands trembling slightly as they took the glasses.

Julian pushed it further. Right in front of me, he handed his glass to the girl clinging to him. "Feed it to me. With your mouth."

Seeing my expression harden, someone immediately tried to defuse the bomb. "Julian, back off a bit. Your wife is standing right here."

Julian just sneered. "What wife? She's just a desperate lapdog."

I didn't stick around to watch her feed him.

I slammed the empty bottle down onto the glass coffee table with a deafening crash, then pivoted on my heels and walked out without looking back, leaving them all staring in stunned silence.

On the drive back to the estate, the memory of my first encounter with Julian flickered in my mind. A mutual friend's birthday party.

The socialites paraded around in evening gownssome haute couture, others cheap knock-offs. I stood out like a sore thumb in a leather jacket and pants. I was having a miserable night.

I downed a few drinks, leaned against the second-floor balcony, and tossed stacks of cash over the edge just for the hell of it. Below, a crowd of scavengers scrambled on the floor to pick it up.

My gaze shifted, and that was when I saw Julian. He was sitting on a heavy motorcycle. The top two buttons of his black shirt were undone, his features sharp and violently cold.

He was just as out of place as I was. He was looking right back at me.

"Want to go for a ride?"

Alcohol always brought out the reckless psycho in me. At his question, I swung my legs over the railing. "Catch me."

Amidst the sudden gasps and screams, I dropped from the low-hanging balcony and landed squarely in Julian's arms.

He smelled of dark sandalwoodsomething distinct, grounding, and intoxicating.

First meeting, I climbed onto his bike and let the wind rip past my ears. Second meeting, our families discussed a corporate merger through marriage, and I bypassed the negotiations to drag him straight to the courthouse to sign the papers.

Someone had snuck a photo at the club. The incident of Julian throwing wine in my face was already trending on social media. The entire city was holding its breath, waiting for me to announce the divorce.

Inside the master bedroom. Julian sat on the edge of the mattress, pinching the bridge of his nose. Frustration radiated from him in waves.

I stared at him with dead eyes. Keep acting.

Earlier tonight, right after he drenched me in that red wine, I had suddenly heard his inner thoughts.

[ What the fuck is this bullshit system. ]

[ Sutton, baby, there's a bottle of vodka right there, throw it back! ]

[ I am such a fucking piece of shit. ]

I had swallowed my pride and played the submissive wife in that VIP room long enough to piece together the truth behind his mental screaming. He was bound by some invisible, twisted system. Its only objective was forcing him to ice me out and humiliate me in public. He had no choice but to comply.

But the second I had walked out of that club, he instantly found an excuse to kick that clinging girl out of the room.

Chapter 2

Right now. A glass of red wine sat on the nightstand.

I picked it up, and his voice immediately exploded in my head.

[ Yes! Throw it back at me! ]

I didn't. I just took a slow sip.

[ My wife loves me so much, she couldn't bear to do it. ]

In reality, Julian hadn't said a single word. He sat there, maintaining his cold, brooding facade.

The alcohol was warming my blood. Feeling flush, I casually undid the top two buttons of my shirt. Julian's frantic internal monologue instantly started up again.

[ Don't look. ]

[ Hold it together. ]

[ Fuck, what if I can't hold it together? ]

The next second, he stood up and closed the distance between us. The dim light carved sharp, icy shadows across his features. His face remained entirely expressionless as he grabbed my collar. With practiced fingers, he buttoned my shirt right back up.

"Keep your clothes on." He cupped his hand over a lighter, sparking a cigarette. "It's ugly."

The words had barely left his mouth, but his Adam's apple bobbed heavily. I had zero tolerance for alcohol, and even less restraint when I was buzzed. The liquor was hitting my brain.

So, I stood right in front of him, slowly undoing the buttons, one by one. I tilted my chin up, locking eyes with him.

"Julian." I let the silence hang. "Don't tell me you can't get it up?"

The room spun slightly. His aggrieved voice immediately whined in my head.

[ You haven't even tried it, baby, how would you know ]

The heavy blackout curtains suffocated the last trace of light in the room. I kicked off my slippers and shoved Julian back onto the mattress. I slapped my palm flat against the hard ridges of his abs.

"Then, let's test that theory."

Julian spat out, "Not interested," but his body betrayed him instantly.

He reached up and ripped my lingerie right down the middle

I woke up with every muscle in my body aching. I rubbed the bridge of my nose. My right hand brushed against something solid and burning hot. I turned my head.

Julian was staring at me.

The absolute absurdity of last night crashed back into my brain, making me want to dig a hole and bury myself. He swept a freezing gaze over me. "Awake?"

At the exact same moment, his internal roar echoed in my skull.

[ Remember! Hurry up and remember how fucking heroic I was last night! ]

I fought back a smirk, dragging my gaze slowly up and down his body. I hooked the corner of my lips and deliberately drawled, "Felt like getting poked by a toothpick last night. Zero presence. Guess your size is completely inversely proportional to your temper."

Julian's brows pulled into a tight knot. "What toothpick?"

I didn't say a word. I just let my eyes drop pointedly toward his waist. "One-star experience. Would not recommend."

Julian's jaw visibly tightened. His mouth didn't open, but my brain was flooded with a barrage of desperate, screaming profanities from the great Julian.

I went to the luxury mall to kill some time, only to run straight into Skylar. Julian's childhood sweetheart. Talk about absolute shit luck. The second she spotted me, she whipped off her sunglasses and marched over.

"Sutton."

She hit me with this exaggerated, fake-concerned gasp, asking why Julian threw a drink at me in public yesterday. The gloating in her eyes was painfully obvious.

Her voice floated with toxic sweetness. "Julian is just too much. Even if he doesn't like you, he shouldn't have humiliated you in front of everyone like that."

I had zero interest in entertaining her high school drama. I turned to leave, but she blocked my path.

"How about you beg me? Maybe I'll sweet-talk Julian into treating you a little better, hmm?"

I scrunched my nose in disgust. "Stop talking." I placed a hand flat against my chest. "You're making me nauseous. Did you eat shit for breakfast? Because your breath is absolute garbage."

I snatched the designer sunglasses right out of her hand, inspecting the frame for a split second. "Don't think buying a few entry-level luxury items and putting on a decent dress makes you actual old money. Want to know why Julian married me and not you?"

I smiled, sliding one of the temples of her sunglasses right into the neckline of her dress. "Eat a little more shit, and maybe I'll tell you."

Chapter 3

When I walked into Julian's office, Skylar was crying her eyes out, putting on a flawless performance. There was a glaringly obvious red handprint on her cheek. The oldest trick in the book. She claimed I was the one who slapped her.

Julian stood next to her, his face freezing over as he demanded to know why I hit her. Inside my head, Julian was practically doing backflips.

[ Fuck yes, nice hit, baby! I absolutely loathe these clingy, fake-ass pick-me girls. ]

I didn't know why, but every time I heard his unfiltered internal screaming, it took everything in me not to laugh out loud. I put on my best hurt expression and walked slowly over to Skylar. She thought I was coming to apologize. The corners of her mouth even twitched up into a smug, victorious little smile.

However, I raised my hand, put my entire shoulder into it, and delivered two vicious, back-to-back slaps right across her face.

"Since you already told everyone I hit you, it'd be a damn shame if I didn't make it a reality."

After a second of pure, stunned silence, Skylar threw herself at Julian, clutching his arm and wailing. Julian frowned, offering her a few mechanical, half-hearted words of comfort. But his mind was screaming.

[ Shit, does my wife's hand hurt? ]

Still, under Skylar's relentless sobbing and instigating, Julian's face hardened as he verbally tore into me. I tilted my head up and looked him dead in the eye.

"My hand hurts."

The glacial ice in Julian's eyes instantly shattered. He pulled open his desk drawer, dug out a first-aid ointment, and carefully rubbed it into my knuckles. Yet, his mouth kept up the ruthless facade.

"Medicine's applied. Now get out."

I cursed him out three hundred and sixty times in my head, flashing him a plastic smile. "Sure. I'll have dinner ready for you at home."

The second the heavy office door clicked shut behind me, I heard Skylar trying to secure a dinner reservation with him for tonight. Julian's tone was dead flat. "No. I have plans."

7:00 PM. It was my first time ever setting foot in a kitchen. I managed to cook an entire table of food that looked terrible, smelled questionable, and probably tasted worse.

When Julian walked through the front door, the raw shock and delight in his eyes were impossible to hide.

[ My wife is a domestic goddess! I fucking love her! ]

[ Thank you, baby! ]

Exactly two seconds later, the emotional steel trap snapped shut. He walked over, swept a disdainful glance over the table, and let out a cold sneer. "Did the estate run out of chefs? Is this garbage even edible?"

I had been swallowing my temper all day. My patience instantly evaporated.

"You're right," I agreed smoothly. I grabbed the plates and scraped every single bite directly into the trash can. "If you can't eat it, it belongs in the garbage."

Julian froze dead by the dining table. His impotent howling practically shook my skull.

[ Don't throw it away! ]

[ Fuck, I didn't even get one bite of the food my wife made for me ]

[ I swear to God, I am going to murder this piece of shit system one day! ]

The anger was still burning hot in my chest. I turned on my heel and stomped upstairs in my slippers. Julian trailed behind me in complete silence. He followed me straight into the master bedroom. I ignored him, dropping face-first onto the mattress. My phone buzzed against the sheets.

It was a news link forwarded by one of my girls. I tapped it. The thumbnail was a stolen photo of me, and the bolded headline was violently offensive.

[ Ultimate Heiress Turns Masochist: High Society's Biggest Lapdog! ]

Noticing the shift in my posture, Julian leaned over and snatched the phone right out of my hand. One second. Two seconds. The bedroom was suffocatingly quiet. I didn't even hear a peep from Julian's internal monologue.

I looked up just in time to see him hurl the device at the wall.

The screen shattered into a spiderweb of dead pixels. At the exact same moment, his voice tore through my mind, dripping with pure venom.

[ That specific media outlet, huh? Consider them dead. ]

[ Which brain-dead reporter wrote that headline? I'm the one who's a desperate lapdog for my wife. ]

[ ]

After verbally slaughtering them in his head, Julian slowly regained his composure. He turned around. He swept a freezing glance over me, his voice dropping to a glacial chill. "This kind of trash journalism damages the family's reputation. I will handle it."

"Okay." I looked up at him. "I'm going to sleep."

My intention was to dismiss him from the room. But hearing that, Julian just raised a single eyebrow.

Chapter 4

He turned his head away. His Adam's apple rolled hard in his throat.

"Yeah."

With a single, low syllable of acknowledgment, Julian reached up and killed the lights. My vision plunged into absolute black. In the pitch dark, his arm hooked around my waist, dragging me precisely into the hard wall of his chest. The night air was freezing, but his voice was colder.

"Don't move."

His heavy palm clamped down on my shoulder. He spun me around, pinning me flat against the edge of the mattress as the full, crushing weight of his body pressed flush against mine.

"Calling you a lapdog isn't exactly wrong." His rough thumb dragged deliberately across my earlobe, leaving a trail of scalding heat against my skin. "The ultimate heiress turning into a desperate masochist. It's stimulating."

The sharp, violent sound of fabric tearing ripped through the silence. A cold sneer brushed against my neck. "Sutton. Isn't this exactly what you wanted?"

The humiliation hung heavy in the dark. Then, Julian's pathetically weak inner voice chimed in.

[ I am so sorry, baby, the damn system forced me to say those lines. ]

[ I sound like a complete, psychopathic creep. ]

He kept rambling on with a mountain of pathetic excuses, but the noise was giving me a headache, so I tuned it out. Even knowing this was all orchestrated by some invisible, bullshit mission, a sickening wave of humiliation still clawed up my throat. I turned my head, my eyes tracing the faint, jagged silhouette of his jawline in the dark. Even obscured by shadows, his profile was devastatingly perfect.

But my patience had officially flatlined.

I twisted my body around, planted my bare foot squarely against his chest, and kicked him hard off the mattress.

"Get out! Drop the disgusting alpha-male act! My bed isn't your personal fucking petting zoo!"

The kick didn't satisfy my temper. I grabbed a heavy pillow and hurled it directly at his head. "Sleep in the hall!"

In the suffocating darkness, Julian went dead silent for two full seconds. Inside his head, however, he was throwing a full-blown parade.

[ My wife screaming at creepy men she is so fucking hot! ]

[ Finally, this toxic forced-romance scene is over. But wait now I don't get to cuddle with my wife tonight ]

Julian scooped the pillow off the floor. His face was a mask of furious, glacial ice as he stalked out the door, while his inner voice practically sobbed the whole way down the hall.

I slept like garbage that night. Separated by a single wall, I could somehow still pick up stray frequencies of his inner monologue. The guy didn't pass out until the early hours of the morning, spending the entire night relentlessly whining about his 'wife' in his head.

Just before the noise faded, I heard him let out a heavy, mental sigh.

[ I need to finish these missions and nuke this bullshit system. All I want right now is to go next door and be my wife's absolute slave. ]

Me:

The sheer volume of Julian's mental chatter completely wrecked my sleep schedule. I didn't actually lose consciousness until the first gray streaks of dawn bled through the curtains. When I finally dragged my eyes open, the midday sun was blasting the room.

Julian was gone. And he didn't come back. I called his private line; it rang out. I went to the corporate headquarters; his executive suite was dead empty. Even his parents had zero clue where the heir to their empire had vanished to.

The only interesting development was the private media outlet that had published that trash article about me a few days ago. Word on the street was they were suddenly drowning in massive legal and financial scandals, and bankruptcy was just days away. Everyone in our social circle knew exactly whose invisible hand was crushing them, but no one dared to breathe a word about it out loud.

I swallowed my irritation for exactly three days before my patience officially expired. I drove out myself to hunt down my legally wedded husband. That same night, I tracked Julian to the base of the mountain pass.

When I pulled up, he was in the middle of a high-stakes drag race. The cash on the line was enough to make a normal person choke. And the kicker? When I arrived, Skylar was glued to the passenger seat behind him, her arms wrapped in a death grip around his waist.

His heavy motorcycle tore past me in a blur of black chrome. Skylar saw me. She was wearing a helmet, leaving only her eyes visible through the visor. As they ripped past my car, she locked eyes with me, and the corners of her eyes crinkled in a massive, triumphant smile.

The provocation in her gaze was blindingly obvious. I didn't say a single word. I just stood there in the dead quiet, waiting for Julian to finish his little race.

Chapter 5

The race ended with Julian's crushing victory, even shattering the city's standing record. Normally, the crowd would be screaming their heads off, but right now, the entire pack of racers and groupies stood in dead silence. The scattered, weak applause that managed to break through was incredibly eerie.

I stood dead center in the crowd and slowly closed the distance. Clap. Clap. I was the one slow-clapping.

"Congratulations, Julian."

Julian just stared at me. His mouth remained shut, and his mind was dead silent. He raised a hand, gripping Skylar's waist to help her off the bike. His gaze swept over me, dropping to absolute zero.

He didn't even acknowledge my words. Not out loud, and not in his head.

A strange, suffocating panic started clawing at my throat. Even if Julian was icing me out on the system's orders, shouldn't he be screaming his head off internally right now?

In the dead quiet, Skylar was the one who broke the ice. She yanked off her helmet and took a step toward me. "Sutton, don't be mad. I've just been so depressed these past couple of days, so I begged Julian to keep me company."

She wore a sickeningly innocent expression, even giving the small of Julian's back a gentle push. "Hurry up and explain it to Sutton."

Julian casually spun his helmet by the strap, not even bothering to spare me a glance. "What's there to explain?"

The mountain wind picked up. He hooked the helmet onto the handlebars, then casually reached out to tuck a stray strand of Skylar's windblown hair behind her ear. The movement was incredibly light. From where I was standing, it looked sickeningly tender.

"She was the one who threw herself at me anyway." Julian's lips hooked into a mocking sneer. "She begged for this marriage. She can choke on the consequences herself. It's only fair."

I froze dead in my tracks.

What stunned me wasn't the absolute venom in Julian's words, but After he delivered that ruthless insult, I still didn't hear a single sound from his internal monologue.

Not a single fucking word.

I stood rooted to the asphalt, entirely incapable of processing a reaction. A terrifying thought pierced my brainwas I just blackout drunk that night? Was it all a hallucination? Did I just imagine being able to read Julian's mind?

After all, even then, his was the only voice I could hear. I hadn't seen him in days, giving me zero opportunity to verify this so-called ability. Now, standing right in front of him for half the night, his mind was a complete dead zone.

My brain was a chaotic, spiraling mess.

For the past twenty years, I was famous for my ruthless arrogance and untouchable status. Most of these people were terrified of me, only daring to talk trash behind my back to vent their pathetic frustrations. But right now, seeing me stand there silently absorbing the abuse, they emboldened themselves behind Julian's status and started taking shots.

The guy standing closest to Julian reached out and clapped a hand on his shoulder. "Julian, rumor has it Sutton is your absolute obedient little pet now. Why don't you give us a live demonstration?"

He smirked. "I would kill to see our untouchable princess crawling on her knees"

He didn't get to finish that sentence before Julian drove a brutal right hook directly into his jaw.

Smack. The guy hit the asphalt hard, knocking over a heavy motorcycle in the process with a deafening crash.

Julian's face was a mask of pure, lethal fury. He brushed the edge of his jacket where the guy had just touched him. His voice dropped to a glacial, terrifying zero. "I fucking hate it when people touch me."

But here was the thing in my memory, Julian was never a germaphobe. He never had a rule against people touching him.

Chapter 6

As I looked at Julian, Skylar took a deliberate step forward. Dead center. Blocking my line of sight completely. Right after Julian explicitly stated he hated being touched, she reached out and wrapped her hand around his arm in a blatant display of territory.

"Julian, don't be mad." She shook his arm, her voice dripping with artificial sweetness. "I'm a little hungry. Why don't I treat everyone to some late-night food?"

Julian was still radiating hostility. But seeing her act cute, he swallowed his temper and forced a tight smile. "It's on me."

From start to finish, he never pushed Skylar's hand away. The crowd knew exactly how to read the room. After the violent outburst earlier, no one wanted to step on a landmine. They all murmured in eager agreement.

People started pairing up and throwing legs over their heavy street bikes. I was the only one left standing alone. I stood rooted to the asphalt, watching Skylar slide onto the pillion seat behind Julian. She locked both arms securely around his waist. Every single pair of eyes was glued to me.

I didn't say a word. I just leveled a calm, deadpan gaze at Julian. Julian was the only one staring off into the distance.

"Sutton," Skylar said, biting her lip with a sickeningly fake look of guilt. "Is it inappropriate for me to sit here?"

I shifted my gaze to her. "You know the answer, so why ask?"

She choked on her next breath, instantly morphing into the victim as she made a pathetic, half-hearted attempt to slide off the bike. "I just wasn't feeling well. But it's fine. I'll get off. You can ride with Julian"

Her mouth kept running, but her hands stayed tightly locked around Julian's waist.

The second she pretended to move, Julian's hand clamped down hard over her wrist. His features were cast in terrifying, pitch-black shadows. He frowned. "You stay right here."

He threw a freezing glance over my shoulder. "She can leave exactly the way she came."

My teeth sank so hard into my bottom lip I tasted copper. It took a full ten seconds to wrestle my temper back down. "Julian. I told my driver to leave when he dropped me off. If you strand me up here in the middle of the night, my only option is to walk down the mountain."

Tonight, I hadn't heard a single syllable of his internal monologue. A cold sliver of doubt slid into my chest. Was that so-called mind-reading ability just a momentary glitch? Or was I completely delusional from the start? As I spoke, my eyes bored into Julian's face, desperate to catch even the slightest micro-expression that would give him away.

But his face was an impenetrable wall of ice. Zero emotional fluctuation. Two seconds of dead silence. He smirked. Nothing but dark, mocking amusement swimming in his eyes.

"Didn't you say you'd do anything for me? Then walk down the mountain. Let me see Ms. Sutton's sincerity."

Suffocating silence. The entire crowd held their collective breath, waiting for the explosion. If this were the old me, I would have already torched his entire setup, hijacked a bike, and ripped down the mountain myself. And I definitely would have dragged that pathetic pick-me girl by her hair before leaving