Chapter 3 - A Mind Beneath the AngerFrom that night on, my daily duties quietly shifted.

While the rest of the household staff avoided the east wing out of fear of Ethan’s outbursts, I requested to handle his meal trays and room maintenance.

At first, Ethan tried to push me away. He would leave food untouched, stare out the high windows at Lake Michigan, or hurl sharp insults to test my patience. But I remained a quiet, unshakeable presence. When he was silent, I left him in peace. When he was frustrated, I listened without judgment.

One rainy afternoon, while dusting his sprawling mahogany bookcases, I noticed a pile of advanced biomechanics and neural rehabilitation textbooks stacked in a corner, covered in dust.

“You were studying medical engineering at Harvard before the accident, weren't you?” I asked gently, running my fingers over a spine.

Ethan glared at the book. “It doesn't matter what I was studying. Those books belong to a dead man.”

“They don't have to,” I replied, pulling a chair up to the table. “I was studying human anatomy before I was brought here. I want to be a physical therapist.”

Ethan scoffed, though a flicker of genuine curiosity glinted in his eyes. “You’re seventeen. You’re a maid.”

“I’m a maid who knows the complete layout of the central nervous system,” I countered, opening a textbook to a diagram of the spinal cord. “Test me.”

For the next two hours, the silent tension between us dissolved into a rigorous, passionate academic debate. Ethan fired complex medical questions at me, and I answered with eager precision. For the first time in eight months, Ethan wasn't thinking about his legs—he was using his brilliant, razor-sharp mind.

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A subtle, breathtaking smile touched his lips.

“Not bad, Claire,” Ethan admitted softly. “Not bad at all.”