Chapter 37 Thirty Seven
Salvatore didn’t slow down.
Didn’t even glance at her properly.
He adjusted her carefully against his chest, as though she were something fragile he had already decided he wanted to handle himself and and just kept walking.
“You shouldn’t be on your feet with that leg,” he said flatly.
His voice wasn’t soft. It wasn’t comforting either.
It was deep… in a way that made it feel less like concern and more like a warning.
Mira’s pulse spiked.
“I was fine,” she snapped immediately, though the closeness of him made her words come out slightly uneven. “I’m literally sitting down. I wasn’t standing.”
His eyes flicked down to her ankle for half a second.
Then back to her face.
As if he didn’t consider her argument worth acknowledging. Like he knew she was scooping around and her ankle didn’t help it was swollen more than it was this morning.
“I warned you,” he said.
That was all.
But the way he said it wasn’t casual.
It carried weight. Not anger exactly… but something sharper. Something that gave him was irritated but she couldn’t tell if it was by her or something else.
Mira stiffened in his arms.
“Warned me?” she repeated under her breath. “You talk like I belong to you or something. Like I did something I shouldn’t have done.”
Salvatore slightly narrowed his eyes as he continued walking, carrying her deeper into the mansion.
“Mira,” he said quietly, “you keep behaving like you don’t understand the consequences of what you do.”
Mira opened her mouth—
Then stopped.
Because there was something in his tone now.
Like he wasn’t threatening her. He was reminding her to know her place.
The mansion doors clicked softly behind them as he moved, and Mira found herself staring up at him instead of the hallway ahead.
His face was calm again.
Way too calm.
As if whatever he had been doing before coming back had been locked away neatly behind that expression.
Mira’s frustration flared again, cutting through the strange tightness in her chest.
“You can’t just pick me up whenever you feel like it,” she muttered under her breath.
Salvatore didn’t even look at her.
“You disobeyed,” he replied evenly. “I told you not to put stress on that leg.”
“That’s not a crime.”
“It is here.”
Mira blinked, thrown slightly by the certainty in his tone.
“That doesn’t even make sense,” she shot back. “I’m not under house arrest.”
His grip her tighter.
“I gave an instruction and you disobeyed,” he said simply. “I do not tolerate disobedience.”
That made her go quiet.
The way he said it made everything in her body go cold.
Mira’s eyes narrowed as she studied his face.
“What does that even mean?” she asked more slowly this time. Trying to hide how fluttered she was.
But Salvatore didn’t answer.
He just kept walking.
The mansion corridor stretched around them in long, silent lines of polished wood and dim light. Every step echoed faintly, swallowed quickly by the heavy quiet that lived inside the walls.
Eventually, he reached her room.
Without hesitation, he pushed the door open.
Then he carried her inside and set her down on the bed, carefully, delicately, as if placing something valuable where it belonged.
Mira shifted immediately, bristling at the treatment.
“I can sit myself down, you know,” she said.
Salvatore’s gaze didn’t leave her.
It lingered.
In a steady, assessing one that made her suddenly aware of everything at once… the room, the silence, and him standing close to where she sat.
“You shouldn’t walk around the mansion like that,” he said finally.
Mira frowned.
“Like what?”
His eyes dipped briefly over her before returning to her face.
“Braless.”
Mira froze.
For a second, her brain refused to process it properly.
Then heat rushed up her neck as she instinctively crossed her arms over her chest.
“What—” she started, immediately flustered. “What the hell?”Mira’s hands tightened over her chest, her glare snapping up at him instantly.
Salvatore’s expression didn’t change.
“There's nothing to hide. Already saw everything when you stepped out this morning,” he said calmly. “There’s no need to act shy now.”
“That’s not— how can you stare at my..,” she muttered, flushed and irritated all at once. “Do you have any sense of privacy at all?”
He watched her for a moment longer.
Then, as if the conversation was already concluded, he turned slightly away—still close enough that the air between them felt charged.
“You’re in my house,” he said quietly. “Privacy is conditional here.”
A pause.
His gaze flicked back to her, calm and unbothered.
“And besides,” he added, voice lower now, “matter-of-fact, I like what I see.”
Mira stiffened instantly.
Before she could respond, he continued without breaking rhythm.
“Just don’t go showing your nipples to every guard in my mansion.”