?Chapter 1440:


    Rosanna looked at the maid without blinking. Something dark stirred in her chest, slow and deliberate.


    Being pointed at and whispered about outside did not matter. But being screamed at by a servant in her own house crossed a line she had no intention of forgiving.


    “Get the doctor,” she said. Her voice came out hoarse, scraped raw by smoke and pain.


    The maid froze, then nodded repeatedly as if her head mighte loose. She scrambled up from the floor and fled down the hall, shoes slipping, breath loud and uneven. Rosanna watched her retreat. Her mouth curved, almost imperceptibly.


    “You scream too much,” she murmured to herself. “When I recover, you will not scream again.”


    Her body was ruined. Her temper was not. If anything, what remained of her had grown sharper.


    The other maids did not speak. They moved toward her carefully, as though approaching a wild animal that mightsh out without warning. Their hands trembled as they supported her weight, every touch hesitant and apologetic. They peeled away the ruined coat. Fabric dragged across open wounds. Rosanna sucked in a breath through her teeth. Pain red. So did hatred.


    Footsteps followed — fast, controlled. The butler entered the living room.


    He had already heard. The fire. The banquet center. Rosanna’s name circting quietly through phones and hurried conversations. He had served the Nelson family for three decades, and he had prepared himself on the way back, telling himself he had seen worse.


    Yet the sight of Rosanna in the living room still jolted him.


    For one unguarded breath, hisposure slipped. She did not look like the Morgan daughter the city had once admired. She looked like someone who had crawled out of an aftermath she refused to speak about. His training caught him before the shock could show. He straightened, smoothed his expression, and stepped forward with a practiced bow.


    “Mrs. Nelson. Wee back.”


    Leaning closer, he dropped his voice to a confidential murmur. “Mr. Nelson returned early today. He is resting in the bedroom on the second floor.”


    Rosanna’s spine stiffened. Not like this. Axell could not see her in this state.


    ?n??е????? ro?????????? ???? ??а??????vе????.c????


    “Do not tell him I am here.” Her voice was low but sharp enough to draw a line. The warning in her eyes needed no further exnation.


    The butler dipped his head. “Understood, Mrs. Nelson. I will inform the staff that you were not seen tonight.”


    A slow breath escaped her, shaky but controlled. She nced around, searching for somewhere to disappear. “Is there a vacant room? I am exhausted. Not on the second floor.”


    The butler gestured politely. “Yes, Mrs. Nelson. The guest rooms on the third floor are prepared. Please follow me.”


    He led her up the thickly carpeted staircase. The quiet deepened on the third floor, as if sound itself had retreated from this part of the house. The butler stopped beside a carved wooden door and pushed it open.


    “You may rest here. The medical team will arrive shortly.”


    The room was immacte — the kind of curated luxury designed tofort without revealing anything personal. Rosanna stepped forward to enter, but her eyes drifted almost involuntarily to a closed door further down the hall.


    A deep brown door. A charm hung from the handle, worn smooth at the edges as though touched many times.


    A strange pull caught at her. A familiarity without context.


    Rosanna paused mid-step. The feeling crept over her slowly at first, then settled with a quiet, unnerving certainty — she had stood here before. That room felt familiar in a way that scraped along her nerves. Even the faint trace of cedar drifting through the air steadied her in a way that made no sense, as though her body recognized something her mind refused to grasp.


    Why? The question pressed against the inside of her skull.


    A sharp, needling pain followed, stabbing deep until she raised a hand and gripped her head, trying to hold the sudden ache together.


    “Whose room is that?” Her voice shook as she pointed at the deep brown door.


    The butler followed her gesture, puzzled by her sudden interest, but answered with polite precision. “That is Mr. Austen Nelson’s bedroom. He has been away for quite some time, so it remains unused.”


    Her fingers ckened. Her vision blurred for a breath.


    “Austen?” She repeated the name slowly, as though tasting something foreign on her tongue.


    The butler assumed she had simply forgotten after the evening’s ordeal. His tone softened. “Yes, Mrs. Nelson. You have met him. He is the second son of the Nelson family — Mr. Austen Nelson.”


    Boom.


    The namended with brutal finality.


    Something inside her cracked. The mental wall she had unconsciously built — thick, cold, imprable — copsed in an instant. A violent surge of memory forced its way through the breach. Her legs gave out. She clutched at her scalp, nails digging into skin, blood trickling down, but she felt none of it.


    “Ah!” The pressure behind her forehead intensified until a raw, guttural cry tore out of her — a sound ripped from somewhere deep and long buried. Tears streamed down her cheeks, mixing with the blood on her swollen face.


    Austen. The name echoed again — not as a stranger’s, but as something she had once held close. Memories flooded in, bright and warm and devastating. She remembered everything.


    Austen was gone. Her beloved was gone.


    .


    .


    .