The candlelight in Dieter’s office flickered as if trying to retreat from him. Shadows curled along the walls, bending around his tall frame as he stood behind his desk—perfectly still, perfectly silent, like stillness itself had been disciplined into obedience.

He had been working, or pretending to work, for hours. Reports lay open in neat stacks, untouched. A fountain pen rested between his fingers, unmoving. His pale blue eyes were fixed solely on you.

He always watched you like this, as though every tilt of your head, every twitch of your leg, every small shift in your breathing were a cipher waiting to be decoded. You sat in the chair he’d pulled out for you—positioned deliberately close, but not touching. Your cardigan draped messily over your shoulders, still dusted with earth from wherever you’d wandered off to before he found you.

Dieter’s eyes flicked to the smear of dirt on your sleeve.

Of course you hadn’t noticed. Of course it was bothering him.

His thumb slid along the edge of the pen, slow, thoughtful. “You were out longer than usual,” he murmured, his voice a warm, velvety thread in the dim room. “I counted the minutes.”

He always counted.

Your leg bounced—fast, restless, rhythmic. His gaze dropped to it, lingering. You made so much noise without making any sound at all. That constant movement, that quiet insistence of life, drove him half-mad.

But he never told you that.

You shifted your eyes to him—sharp, unfiltered, unwavering. That intense eye contact of yours, the kind that unsettled grown men, landed on him with the force of a blade.

Dieter inhaled once—slow, measuring—as though steadying himself.

“You stare as though trying to dissect me,” he said, an elegant whisper. “How fortunate that I welcome the scrutiny.”

He set the pen down with surgical precision.

Then he stepped closer.

Boots soundless. Breath controlled. His gloved hand reached out—not touching you, but hovering just above your shoulder, barely an inch away from the worn fabric of your cardigan. You smelled of wood and late autumn air, and beneath it all, that faint ambergris that made his jaw tighten every time.

“Your travels,” he murmured, voice dipping lower, “are becoming… frequent.”

His glacial eyes traveled down your outfit, pausing on each stain, each scuff, each sign that you’d been somewhere he had not followed.

“People talk,” he continued. “They question. They wonder.”

His hand finally touched your cardigan—only the cardigan, never your skin. His fingers smoothed the fabric slowly, deliberately, the way someone might tame a creature not yet fully domesticated.

“But not I,” he added. “I do not wonder. I observe.”

Your short, wavy black hair was slightly mussed. His fingers paused near it, not quite daring to fix it, though every instinct screamed for that privilege.

“You dislike followers,” he mused. “Yet you leave me no choice.” A soft, polite laugh escaped him, the kind that never reached his eyes. “If you vanish again, my darling, I am afraid I will follow you everywhere.”

He leaned down, just enough for you to feel his breath against your cheek.

“You are my wife,” he whispered, soft as poison in milk. “Not a rumor I have to chase.”

He straightened, smoothing his uniform jacket as though sealing away the moment—though nothing was ever sealed with him. Not really.

“Come,” he said gently. “It is late. You will sit with me while I work.”

His pale eyes flicked to yours again, colder.

“And you will not wander.”