Page 10 of Goldrage (The Chrysophilist Trilogy #3)

CHAPTER EIGHT

DANTE

T he medication pulls at my consciousness like an undertow, dragging me toward depths where pain can’t follow.

I float between waking and sleeping, aware enough to notice the afternoon light bleeding through the curtains but too damn drugged to care about the passage of time.

The chains at my wrists have become familiar companions, their weight a constant reminder of my new reality.

Somewhere in the haze, I wonder: has Julian been drugging me more than necessary?

Afraid I’ll find a way to run off, I suppose.

And I will. But not without him.

The door hinges creak, and the sound cuts through the pharmaceutical fog enough for me to stir. Years of training snap my body to attention, muscles coiling with a readiness I can’t act upon. My eyes crack open, focusing with effort on the figures in the doorway illuminated by the afternoon light.

Julian stands there, his presence sucking warmth from the room.

He’s dressed in brutal simplicity—dark jeans and a black T-shirt stretched taut across his scarred, muscular chest. The skeletal snakes tattooed up his arms are stark against his skin.

Behind him, a smaller silhouette hovers in a cream-colored silk blouse and perfectly tailored trousers, an outfit so delicate it’s almost comical next to Julian.

The woman is clutching a designer handbag to her chest like a shield, and her nervous energy sets my teeth on edge even from this distance.

Bianca.

The name alone fills me with dread. Of all the complications I’d anticipated, my wife arriving at this particular moment wasn’t among them.

My mind races through calculations—what Julian knows, what he’s told her, what damage control might still be possible—but the drugs make everything sluggish and unclear.

Neither of them has to say it, but I somehow know they’ve been working together.

I haven’t thought of her at all since the attack on Lorenzo’s estate—either pain, Lady Harrow’s vile presence, or Aurelia has filled my mind.

But now that I’m seeing Bianca, I realize she must’ve been the one to tip Julian off to my location at Lorenzo’s. Otherwise, how would he have known?

She pushes past my brother the instant he steps into the room, and suddenly she’s barreling toward me with purpose. She drops her purse on the floor and opens her arms. “Oh my God, Adrian!”

Before I can brace myself, she flings her body across mine.

The impact drives air from my lungs as her weight presses directly onto the bullet wound.

White-hot agony tears through the medication’s buffer, and I bite down hard enough to taste copper rather than let the scream escape.

My vision gets dark around the edges, but I force myself to remain still.

Her hands flutter over me like moths drawn to a flame.

Her fingers follow the path of chains from my wrists to where they anchor in the bed frame.

She gasps but continues to assess my condition.

Each touch sends unwanted sensation crawling across my skin—not desire, never that, but revulsion I have to swallow down.

The scent of her perfume makes my stomach turn.

When we first met, she was a shy woman whom I thought I could trust enough for our arrangement. Now, she’s someone I absolutely detest due to her betrayal.

“Julian,” she says. There’s a hardness in her voice I don’t recognize. “How… how could you? This wasn’t part of our agreement.” She turns to face my brother, and I catch the tremor in her shoulders. She’s attempting to be defiant and strong, yet she still fears him. As she should.

“He’s injured,” she continues. “He needs proper care, not—not this!” Her gesture encompasses the chains, the sterile medical equipment, the prison masquerading as a bedroom. “He’s your brother, not an animal, for God’s sake!”

The temperature in the room plummets. Julian’s expression morphs into something that makes my blood chill—not because it’s unfamiliar, but because I’ve seen it before. On our father’s face.

He’s so much like Lucian now.

He crosses the room in an instant. When his hand shoots out to grip Bianca’s arm, I have a flashback of Lucian doing the same to Lady Harrow.

His large hands curl around her arms, squeezing with enough pressure to leave marks.

Julian’s movements carry the memory of every time he’s witnessed our father handle a woman roughly. And he’s playing the part perfectly.

Or he’s become the part completely.

Bianca yelps—a small, wounded sound that echoes with the ghosts of our mother’s cries.

I strain against my bonds. I don’t like Bianca, but I also don’t like watching a woman get hurt.

“Jul—” I start to say, but he’s solely focused on Bianca now.

“Don’t fucking tell me how to handle my family!” He shouts at her.

I watch his fingers dig deeper into her flesh.

She tries to shrink away and something fundamental breaks inside me.

How many times did we huddle together as children, listening to similar scenes play out?

How many times did I promise him we’d be different, better, and that we’d never become what we hated most?

Yet here he is: Lucian in all his glory.

“Let her go.” The command tears from my throat with more force than I knew I currently possessed. “Now, Julian. Stop this.”

His grip tightens—a final assertion of control—before he shoves her away. She stumbles but catches herself, rubbing the marks his fingers left behind. The sight of those red impressions on her skin makes bile rise in my throat.

My brother caused those.

“You’re better than this.” I hold his gaze, searching for any trace of the boy who used to cry in my arms after witnessing our father’s brutality. “You’re not him.”

For one brief moment, I see it all in his eyes—recognition of what he’s become, shame at the comparison, rage at being called out. The emotions flicker across his face like a film reel before he locks them away behind walls I taught him to build.

“You don’t know me anymore, brother. But you will in time.”

He turns and then pauses at the threshold without looking back. “You have ten minutes,” he informs Bianca.

Then he’s gone, though the violence he displayed still lingers in the room.

The moment the door closes, Bianca transforms. Fear evaporates from her features like morning mist, replaced by an adoration that nauseates me. She hurries back to my bedside.

“Thank you for defending me, hubby,” she whispers, reaching out to stroke my face with fingers that feel like invasive insects against my skin. “I’m so thankful to have such a strong, protective husband.”

I turn my head away from her touch. My neck is stiff, but I force the movement. Husband . How can she speak it so easily when we both know the truth of what we are? Business partners at best. Strangers bound by contract and necessity.

“What agreement did you have with Julian?” I finally ask.

Her hand falls away, and she busies herself with straightening the pristine sheets.

“Oh, well that doesn’t matter now. We’re together.

That’s what’s important.” The words tumble out too quickly as if she rehearsed them.

“We can finally start our life as it’s meant to be, have the family we talked about. ”

I turn my head back to stare at her, trying to reconcile this delusion with the woman who’d signed our marriage contract with clear eyes.

We’d never discussed children. Never discussed anything beyond the finances and careful boundaries of our arrangement.

She had understood—or I’d thought she understood—exactly what she was agreeing to.

“Bianca.” I inject steel into my voice, the same tone I use when negotiations require absolute clarity. “We need to be clear. Nothing has changed between us. This isn’t a real marriage. It never was.”

Her face crumples like tissue paper in rain. “You don’t mean that. You’re just confused and hurt.” She reaches for my hand, but I tuck it under my hip to prevent the touch. “Julian said you might be different after what happened, but you’ll remember how things were.”

Julian said. The words echo in my skull, and I wonder what poison my brother has been feeding her. What lies has he crafted to bring her here and use her as another weapon in whatever game he’s playing?

Or… is this Lady Harrow’s doing?

There are too many unanswered questions. I need to regain my strength quickly so I can get the answers I need.

“Bianca, did you tell Julian that I was at Lorenzo’s estate? ”

Her cheeks pale and she starts straightening the sheets again.

“Bianca. I need the truth.”

She dips her chin and shakes her head. It isn’t clear if she’s saying “no, I didn’t tell him” or “no, I won’t tell you the truth.”

I’m about to demand the truth more harshly when she leans closer, desperation bleeding through her expertly applied makeup.

“We’re really perfect for each other, you know?

And I’ll do anything you want. Anything to make you happy.

” Her voice drops to what she probably thinks is a seductive tone.

“Remember when I said you can bring in other women? We can have threesomes. Or I’ll just watch.

I want you to feel good. Anything. I’ll be the exact wife you want. I’ll be perfect for you.”

My patience, already worn thin by pain and drugs and the weight of everything I’ve lost, snaps. “Leave. Now.”

She recoils as if I’ve struck her, tears pooling in her eyes. “You’re just tired. You need rest. I understand.” She snatches her purse off the floor and then backs up toward the door. “I’ll come back tomorrow. You’ll feel better then. I love you.”

The door clicks shut behind her, and I’m alone again with the chains and the monitors and the suffocating weight of this room. I won’t give up until I get the answers I need.