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CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

JULIAN

I ’m in my office while Valentine drones on about business. I lean back in my office chair and stare at the empty room on my monitor, the void where she should be more stark and hollow than I expected. Aurelia’s absence claws at me even though I’m the one who created it by sending her away.

Thirty days. That’s all Lorenzo gets. The fucker had the nerve to ask for three months—three fucking months.

I wanted two weeks, enough time for her to get a taste of someone else’s control before bringing her back to where she belongs.

We settled on one month, and only because I realized she needs that time to see how much better she has it here. With me.

My jaw ticks as I remember Lorenzo’s eyes when we discussed terms, the hint of satisfaction.

“I have to ask,” I’d said, finishing my second glass of whiskey. “Why her?”

He had smiled—a slow, deliberate curving of his lips that made my skin crawl. “You really need to ask?” His accent had thickened, Italian vowels dripping with need. “She is… special. I’ve watched her for some time. Such spirit. I enjoy breaking things of beauty. And I’m particularly skilled at it.”

He said it with such conviction that I can only imagine what he has planned for Aurelia.

Valentine’s voice drags me back to the present. “—about thirty percent drop in supply since Victoria’s operation fell apart. The Castellano’s claim to have some influence and are willing to step in, but they want double the percentage Victoria was getting.”

I blink, forcing myself to focus. Valentine stands on the other side of the desk, tablet in hand, scrolling through figures and charts. His expression is detached, like he hasn’t spent weeks watching me keep his daughter prisoner.

“They don’t get double,” I say mindlessly. “Renegotiate.”

My thoughts keep circling back to the empty room on the screen, to Aurelia in Lorenzo’s hands. What is he doing to her right now? The question burns through me like acid, eating away at my focus.

Valentine keeps talking and I only catch fragments. “—Whitman family could—” and “—need to maintain control of the eastern distribution—” and “—still looking into Carter’s operation?—”

His voice is a meaningless white noise against the roar in my head.

I imagine Aurelia seeing what it’s truly like in the Consortium, experiencing firsthand what the other men are capable of.

Men like Lorenzo, with his too-perfect hair and practiced charm.

Men with appetites that make me look downright virtuous in comparison.

She’ll understand soon. When she comes back—when I bring her back—she’ll see that I was protecting her all along. That the cage I built was lined with silk, not barbed wire like theirs.

Part of me feels sick at the thought of her with him and my fingernails dig crescents into my palms. But the other part, the calculating part that’s becoming more like Adrian every day, knows this is necessary.

She needs some humiliation at another man’s hands.

She needs to be punished for what she did.

And she needs perspective to understand her place in this world.

To understand that it’s with me.

I sink deeper into my chair. On the monitor, the bed where I fucked her and made her mine again, is perfectly made. The bathroom door is still slightly ajar.

Missing her feels like withdrawal, my body craving what it knows it can’t have.

But she’ll come back aa a new woman, ready to submit.

She’ll come back and fall into my arms, her fear giving way to gratitude. It’ll be like waking up from a bad dream and realizing the nightmare was real. Maybe she’ll cry, those tears I’ve always imagined breaking through her perfect self-control. She’ll beg to stay here, with me.

It’s what I’ve wanted all along.

In my mind, it happens the moment I open the door. She’s on her knees before I can say a word, her eyes wide and desperate. “Julian,” she whispers, voice cracked but full of that fire I’ve always loved. “You were right.”

And just like that, she’s mine again.

She tells me everything, confesses until she can’t breathe. How Lorenzo used her body, how he twisted her mind until she didn’t know who she was anymore.

She’ll be so broken; she’ll beg for forgiveness. “I’m sorry I killed Adrian. It was wrong. Please forgive me.”

I’ll have to punish her but this time, it’s different. More intense. She’s left so many scars on my heart that it’s only right I leave some on her flawless skin. But she craves the pain.

I’ll pull out my knife after she sucks my cock to get it wet, then I’ll make her spread her legs for me.

“You’ve been a bitch, you know that?” I’ll say, teasing her delicate inner thigh with my knife blade.

“I’m sorry, Julian. Do what you have to. I’m yours.”

I’ll slide my cock in just as I run the blade along her thigh. She’ll gasp my name, pleasure mixed with pain.

“More, Julian.”

I’ll give her more, fucking her harder as I make another line of red bloom along her stomach.

She’ll keep begging, pleading for all the torment I have to give, wanting me to mark her fully as mine.

She’ll love it just like she did that night at the amusement park; she’ll quiver and begs and take everything I want to give.

Back in the present, my cock is hard under the desk.

I can’t fucking wait for Aurelia to return. I can’t ever forgive her for what she did, but watching her break and then beg for me makes it easier to try .

Maybe one day I’ll admit that I admire her for pulling the trigger in the first place. One ballsy move. Her taste for revenge is almost as big as mine for blood, and thinking about both gets me even harder.

I finally understand why father thought the way he did; why letting others play with his women made him feel powerful enough to watch without interference.

Because it makes them cling to you harder.

Sick fucker knew exactly what he was doing all along.

I’ve underestimated that power until now—the thrill of watching someone come back with needs only you can satisfy.

Sinful as hell, but fascinating.

Just as I’m about to palm my cock while Valentine is distracted by his tablet and droning on about bullshit I really don’t care about, a scream pierces my memories.

My mother’s scream.

Then I see my father as I watch through a crack in the door. I’m only a kid, maybe seven, and Lucian and Mother were in this very office.

He has his belt wrapped around her throat.

“Fucking whore,” he growls, “did you enjoy how Xavier fucked you?”

“No,” Mother chokes out. “No. I missed you. I only thought of coming back to you because you fuck me so much better.”

He tightens the belt around her throat and pushes her dress up. “That’s right. Good girl.”

I turn away but whatever he does next makes Mother scream again .

Her screams always hollowed the house. And I want to do that to Aurelia? I want her love to come from fear? To treat her roughly and cruelly, the way Lucian treated Mom?

My stomach clenches. I imagine us having a son someday. I imagine her body bent under me as I hurt her, our son’s eyes peeking through the same door, seeing the same cruelty. Feeling what I felt.

Sourness rises in my throat and it takes effort to hold it back.

“Valentine—”

He looks up from his tablet, surprised by the urgency in my voice.

“Get out. Now.”

He doesn’t ask questions, just nods and leaves with quick, obedient steps.

As soon as he’s gone, I lurch forward and empty my guts into the trashcan.

Everything comes up in convulsions, acid burning my throat as I choke on bile and gasps of air.

When it’s finally over, I slump back in my chair, breathing hard.

I need a drink.

After moving to the bar in the corner, I uncork a bottle and drink straight from the opening.

The whiskey burns going down but it doesn’t stop me swallowing more and more until the fire inside starts to numb.

The office around me blurs at the edges, but it’s not enough—not yet—and the betrayal of my own body makes me slam a fist on the desk.

I’m losing it. All of it—Aurelia, control—slipping through my fingers because I don’t know how to hold on anymore. I don’t want to become Lucian, but I tried Adrian’ s way, didn’t I? I tried to be patient and investigate Lucas Carter, yet that turned into a nightmare.

It’s not who I am and never was.

So who am I?

Another swig of whiskey and memories dissolve into a haze.

I don’t want to think about anything anymore. Not her absence or her coming back or what will happen when she does. Blackout—that’s what I need—and this time nothing short of it will do.

I tilt the bottle against my lips and drink until the room spins. Somewhere in that spin, the dark urges take hold again.

I grab my phone and send a message to Lorenzo:

When you play with her, send pics. I need to know you’re satisfied with your merchandise.