The Monster's Wife Has a Secret He Cannot Hear

§01

To survive my marriage to the city’s most feared man, Dax Sheridan, I had a secret: I wasn’t deaf.

It was a desperate lie, conceived in the five minutes it took for his black Cadillac to deliver me to the gates of his sprawling, gothic estate.

A gilded cage.

The arrangement had been sealed by my adoptive father, a man drowning in debts I never knew he had.

I was the final payment.

“The System,” a disembodied voice that had thrown me into this novel’s universe, had been brutally clear.

My mission was to make the villain, Dax Sheridan, fall in love.

Apparently, his single-minded focus on vengeance was derailing the entire plot for the story’s heroes.

But as the heavy iron gates groaned open, revealing a mansion that looked more like a fortress, survival felt like a more pressing goal than romance.

A man who had been single for twenty-eight years, surrounded by wealth and power, wasn’t just uninterested in love.

He was dangerous.

So the plan formed, a fragile shield against the unknown.

If I was broken, I couldn’t be a threat.

If I was deaf, I couldn’t be a spy.

The car door opened.

A tall man stood silhouetted against the harsh porch lights.

Dax Sheridan.

His sharp, intense eyes locked onto mine, a defining mole just below the corner of one, making him look perpetually severe.

He had a buzz cut, and a tailored suit that did nothing to hide the brutal strength in his shoulders.

He was the kind of beautiful that felt like a warning.

As he approached, I steeled myself.

The moment he sat down across from me in the cavernous, silent living room, I began to sign.

“A mute?” he asked, his voice a low gravel, a frown creasing his brow.

I pointed to my ear and shook my head.

Then I picked up a pen and a notepad from the marble coffee table, my hand surprisingly steady.

[My hearing is severely impaired. My hearing aids were lost in transit. I can’t understand what you’re saying, Mr. Sheridan.]

He scanned the note, his expression unreadable.

He took the pen, and in a scrawled, almost illegible script, he wrote back.

[What’s your name?]

§02

[Quinn Huxley.]

Dax Sheridan started to write something else, then stopped, his jaw tight.

He threw the pen down on the sofa with a grunt of frustration.

“Fuck, my handwriting is atrocious,” he muttered, seemingly to himself.

He really thought I couldn’t hear.

He let out a heavy sigh and called out towards the kitchen.

“Maria, get Ms. Huxley to a specialist tomorrow. Order a new pair of hearing aids.”

Panic seized me.

A specialist would expose my lie in seconds.

The System had provided a prop kit.

My hand slipped into my pocket, fingers closing around the small, flesh-colored devices.

While his back was turned, I dropped one of the hearing aids onto the tiled floor, nudging it under the coffee table with my foot.

I let out a small, sharp gasp, feigning frantic distress.

I pointed at the floor, then grabbed his hand, turning it palm up.

His skin was rough, calloused.

My fingertip traced letters against his skin, a strange intimacy in the desperate act.

[HEARING AID. I SEE IT. UNDER THE TABLE.]

A flicker of something—annoyance? curiosity?—crossed his face.

He pulled his hand back as if my touch had burned him.

He bent down, retrieved the device, and wiped it clean with a handkerchief.

After a moment of fumbling, he gently placed it in my left ear.

His breath was hot against my skin as he leaned in close.

“My name is Dax Sheridan. Your husband. Quinn Huxley, can you hear me now?”

I flinched back as if electrocuted.

A low, humorless chuckle escaped his lips.

“A little deaf thing. And a coward too.”

I lowered my head, my hands moving in what I hoped looked like a gesture of understanding.

[Go to hell, you asshole.]

“What does that mean?” he asked, his eyes narrowed.

I forced my voice out, deliberately pitching it unnaturally, making the words slightly slurred, as someone unaccustomed to their own sound might.

“It means… thank you, Mr. Sheridan. You are very… kind.”

Because in a world without sound, you can’t perfectly replicate a voice you’ve never heard.

§03

He stared at me for a long time, his expression unreadable.

I couldn’t tell if it was disgust or just cold indifference.

Disgust would be better.

I didn’t want to be his wife.

I just had to survive until the end of this novel’s plot, then I could go home.

But his next move shattered my plans for quiet solitude.

He turned, grabbed my suitcase, and headed straight for the second floor.

No, he couldn’t be.

I was supposed to be in a guest room on the first floor.

“Wait…” I called out, my voice cracking.

I scrambled after him, grabbing the hem of his jacket.

My hands flew in a frantic series of signs.

[I can stay downstairs.]

[My luggage. Give it back.]

Dax looked down at me, his face a mask of stone.

“I know it’s your luggage. I’m helping you move it into my bedroom.”

He added, with a deadpan lack of sincerity, “You’re welcome.”

My mind went blank.

I’m thanking your what?

Who said anything about sharing a room with you?

In a surge of adrenaline, I yanked the suitcase back with surprising force.

He stared at me, his eyes turning glacial.

“What’s that supposed to mean? You don’t want to stay with me? You find me repulsive?”

He let out a series of short, harsh laughs.

“Fine. Whatever. Do what you want.”

I felt the hearing aid in my ear, a cold sweat breaking out under my arms.

This was a mistake.

This was the villain of the story.

The man who put the hero in the hospital for fun.

What was I thinking, challenging him?

He could have his men drag me out and beat me without a second thought.

Realization dawned, cold and sharp.

I awkwardly pushed the suitcase back towards him.

With my hands signing, I spoke slowly, word by word, “It’s not… that I find you repulsive. I’m just… a little… afraid.”

§04

“Afraid? Of what? Do I look like a monster?”

Dax hung my dresses in the walk-in closet, one by one.

He turned and went into the ensuite bathroom, glancing at me in the mirror as he washed his hands.

I sat primly on the edge of the massive bed, wringing my own hands.

I had already taken out my hearing aid for the night, so I pretended not to hear him.

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