Page 35 of Goldrage (The Chrysophilist Trilogy #3)

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

DANTE

T he dinner table stretches between us like a battlefield where no one dares make the first move. Julian’s mandate brings us together nightly—him, Mother, Bianca, Aurelia, and me—yet we might as well be strangers. My fork scrapes against porcelain and I winch.

“Oh, did I mention I joined an online book club?” Bianca says. She’s usually the only one talking like this. “We’re reading this book about a duke who falls for his stable girl.”

No one responds. Julian stares at his plate, barely eating. Lady Harrow pushes food around without focus. And Aurelia?—

I force my gaze down before it can linger. One glance at those green eyes might unravel everything. My chest tightens with the effort of not looking, not reaching across this mahogany expanse to touch her hand.

“I like the forbidden love,” Bianca continues, oblivious or perhaps willfully ignorant of the tension coiling around us.

“How the duke has to maintain appearances while his heart belongs to someone deemed inappropriate by society.” Her lashes flutter at me and some of my meal threatens to come back up my throat.

My jaw clenches. How ironic, though I doubt Bianca possesses enough awareness to craft such pointed commentary intentionally.

Julian’s knife cuts through his salmon. The blade screeches against the plate, making Lady Harrow flinch. He doesn’t apologize. Doesn’t even seem to notice. These dinners are his creation—his attempt at a happy family—yet he contributes nothing but brooding silence.

“More water, hubby?” Bianca reaches for the crystal pitcher before I can decline. “You need to stay hydrated. This water has electrolytes. I had the kitchen staff add them specially for you. Good for recovery.”

I frown. Guess that explains why she’s hoarded that pitcher all night and hasn’t let anyone else touch it.

The liquid fills my glass despite my lack of response. I drink to avoid conversation, though my stomach already feels heavy from the rich meal. Salmon in cream sauce, roasted vegetables drowning in butter, potatoes whipped with enough dairy to clog arteries. Every bite sits like lead in my gut.

I’m feeling quite sluggish and tired.

Lady Harrow hasn’t touched her wine tonight. Unusual. Her fingers drum against the stem of her empty glass while her gaze darts between Julian and me.

What might you be plotting?

“The heroine’s friend in my book reminds me of someone,” Bianca muses, cutting her fish into squares. “Red hair, fiery temperament, tendency to challenge authority...”

Aurelia’s fork stills mid-air. Just for a heartbeat. Then she continues eating as if Bianca hadn’t spoken. But I catch the slight tremor in her hand, the way her shoulders draw tight.

She looks ready to strangle Bianca. For whatever reason, Bianca has been using the term “hubby” quite excessively this evening.

My chest burns with the need to defend Aurelia, to shut down whatever game Bianca thinks she’s playing. Instead, I reach for my water glass and drain it in long swallows.

“Fascinating,” Lady Harrow says, her first word of the evening. The single syllable drips with disdain that Bianca either misses or chooses to ignore.

“Isn’t it? I just love how the duke struggles between duty and desire. Family obligations versus true love. Very relatable.”

Julian’s head snaps up. His eyes find mine across the table, dark and unreadable.

And what might you be plotting, brother?

The moment passes. He returns to his meal without acknowledgment.

Bianca refills my glass again. “Drink up. Doctor’s orders.”

I frown. Not my doctor. Not any doctor, actually. Just Bianca’s perpetual need to fuss and hover and insert herself where she isn’t wanted. I don’t touch the glass because my stomach feels ready to burst.

“The book club meets Wednesdays,” she continues, apparently immune to the collective disinterest. “It’s online, but I’ve been thinking of finding an in-person group. I could host it here. Wouldn’t that be cool? We could use the blue parlor and?—”

“No,” Julian says.

Bianca’s face falls as she cowers from Julian’s firm tone. “Oh. Of course. Okay.” Finally, she falls silent.

My body grows heavier, exhaustion seeping into my bones. My rehabilitation exercises from this afternoon must’ve drained me more than I thought.

“You look tired, hubby.” Bianca’s hand hovers near my arm.

“I’m fine.”

“Still, you should rest. Healing requires proper sleep. I read an article about the importance of sleep cycles in recovery. Apparently, the body does most of its repair work during deep sleep phases?—”

“Then I should retire,” I say. I really can’t stand to listen to more of her chatter, so I’ll take this opportunity to escape.

I push back from the table, movements careful to hide the way the room tilts slightly. Too much rich food. Too much water. Too much of Bianca’s suffocating presence.

“I’ll help you to your room.” She’s already rising, napkin discarded beside her plate.

“That’s unnecessary.”

“Nonsense. What kind of wife would I be if?—”

“Bianca.” Julian’s tone leaves no room for argument. “Sit.”

She sits. The flush creeping up her neck speaks to embarrassment or anger or both, but she obeys. In this house, Julian’s word is law.

I stand, gripping the table edge until the momentary dizziness passes. Finally, I manage to straighten.

I catch Aurelia’s gaze and she looks concerned. I dip my chin, hoping she understands my silent response: “I’m okay. Just tired.”

“Good night.” The words encompass the table without focusing on anyone in particular. I don’t trust myself to look at Aurelia as I say it. I don’t trust my expression to remain neutral when every cell in my body screams to go to her.

The walk to my room feels endless. Each step requires more concentration than it should, my thoughts swimming through thick fog. Behind me, Bianca’s heels click. Of course she ignored Julian’s implicit command to stay put.

“Adrian, wait?—”

I don’t wait. Can’t wait. My body craves horizontal surfaces and darkness and silence. The door to my room appears and I reach for it.

“Let me at least check that you have fresh water,” she insists, hovering at the threshold and holding the pitcher off the table. “And your medications. Did you take them with dinner? I didn’t see?—”

“Everything’s fine. Good night.” My tone is a little harsh, but I really need distance from her.

Her mouth opens for another protest, but something in my expression must finally penetrate. She deflates, shoulders sagging. “Good night, hubby. Sleep well.”

The door closes between us. I lean against it, breathing deep in the sudden quiet. My head swims, thoughts scattering. Too much stimulation. Too much pretending. Too much of everything except what I actually need.

Aurelia.

I lean heavily on my cane as I cross the room to the bed. I collapse onto the mattress fully clothed, not bothering with the curtains or covers or any other nighttime rituals.

I’m simply exhausted. So exhausted in fact, I worry that I might be coming down with an illness. This kind of deep, internal fatigue doesn’t feel normal.

But I can’t hold the thought. The ceiling spins lazy circles above me. An odd sensation, like being drunk without alcohol’s pleasant blur.

My eyelids grow heavy. Between one blink and the next, darkness swallows me whole.

The night shifts and moves, time melting and pooling in strange corners of the room.

I drift in and out of consciousness, an odd half-sleep like my body won’t let me rest. Sometimes I surface, gasping, with the taste of iron on my tongue; sometimes I sink, clutching at formless shapes that dissolve before I can assemble them into meaning.

A buzzing, high and insistent, sets up residence in my inner ear.

I don’t remember fully falling asleep, but when I open my eyes the room is as it was—dark, silent, the garden lights leaking through the windows. Except I’m not alone.

She stands at the foot of my bed.

“Aurelia?” I croak, or try to, but the word doesn’t come out right. My tongue is thick and uncooperative. I struggle to focus. The outline of her hair—red, impossibly vibrant even in darkness—flares like a wound against the gray.

Her eyes, green as absinthe, pulse with concern. She moves closer, so fluid she must be floating. Her scent—vanilla—hollows me out.

I try to sit up, but gravity keeps me pinned.

My muscles are feeble and I can’t move. She sits at my side, the mattress dipping beneath her weight.

I blink, trying to clear the haze from my vision, but it only erases more details.

Her hands are on me—one at my brow, cool and careful, the other stroking my forearm in small, concentric circles. I sigh at the comfort.

“I was worried,” she says, voice syrupy and slow. “You seemed so tired at dinner.”

I try to respond but her palm cups my cheek and she hushes me with a thumb pressed to my lips.

“Don’t talk. Let me take care of you.” She leans close, and for a moment, the shadow at her temple seems wrong—too sharp, too linear, but then her lips are at my ear and that’s all I can think about.

She whispers nonsense syllables, little gasps and fragments of comfort. I want to reach for her, but my hands don’t obey. When I try to move, she hushes me again, nails raking softly at my scalp.

Then she starts pushing up my shirt. I laugh, or think I do, but it comes out as a groan. Her hair spills forward, obscuring her face. The red is too red, like something from a fever dream. It’s almost cartoonish.

She peels the fabric away from my chest and traces her fingers over the bruises and bandages. Her touch is soft, lighter than breath, but every contact sends a shock through me, an electric jolt that pools heat in my abdomen.

My Aurelia.

She’s talking again, almost chanting. “You don’t have to do anything. I want to make you feel good. You deserve it. You deserve so many women.”

So many… what?

She pulls down the top of my sweats. Cool air kisses my skin, and I realize that I’m half-hard already. I can’t deny how much I want her. She’s all I think about.

Her hair sweeps across my stomach, tickling. Then her hand grips me. The touch is so gentle, so deliberate. She strokes once, twice, and I grow harder beneath her palm.

I can’t move. I can’t do anything but yield.

She hums, as if pleased. Then, with a flourish, she undoes the top button of her blouse. Her breasts spill out, pale in the half-light, and I can’t look away. The sight alone sends a jolt through me, a pulse of need so strong my hips twitch of their own accord.

“You’re doing so well,” she says, milking my cock with slow, steady precision. “You’re always so serious. Let yourself be taken care of.”

My thoughts scatter. I want to say her name, but I can’t even manage a syllable. The pleasure builds, sharp and insistent, until my body is nothing but a desperate ache.

Her lips close around my length, warm and slick, and I moan. Not a word, just a raw sound torn from somewhere deep. I’d give anything to be inside her but I can’t voice that desire, I can only moan helplessly as she pleasures me.

She bobs her head, hair brushing my thighs, hands stroking in time with her mouth. I’m delirious. Every sensation is multiplied by the fever in my blood, the fire in my groin as my balls tighten for release.

She pulls back, squeezing and pumping with expert rhythm. “You’re close, aren’t you?” Her voice thickens, turning guttural, almost feral. “Let go for me. I want all of it. All of you. Give me a big load.”

Something about her tone, the greedy drawl, makes my stomach flutter with confusion. It isn’t how Aurelia speaks, but the pleasure’s too consuming for doubt to take root.

I come, shuddering, and my mind is wiped clean. She cups the head, catching every drop in her hand. For a moment, I swear she’s holding a plastic container, but my vision blurs and it dissolves into nothing.

She wipes me down, cleans the mess with a folded cloth that smells faintly of bleach. I try to reach for her, to speak of my love, to ask her to stay so I can hold her, but my arms won’t lift. My eyelids close and refuse to open again.

I fall backward into sleep so deep it feels like dying.

Consciousness returns in fragments. Birds chirp outside the window.

Cool air from the AC ghosts across my exposed chest. Cotton fills my mouth, thick and stale.

My head pounds in rhythm with my heartbeat, each pulse sending spikes of pain through my skull.

Morning light filters through curtains I don’t remember drawing.

But that’s not what makes my breath catch.

Her scent lingers in the air—vanilla. It’s not my imagination or wishful thinking, but real. And I’m laying here with my shirt pulled up, something I didn’t do. She was here. The certainty of it sets my pulse racing even as my foggy mind struggles to piece together memories.

Darkness. Dizzy, disconnected floating. Then?—

Red hair spilling across my chest. Soft lips around my cock. Gentle hands pulling moans from my throat. Everything hazy and dreamlike, my body too heavy to respond.

But I did finish. I remember that.

The memories feel more like a dream, but her scent doesn’t lie. Neither does the slight indentation on the mattress beside me or the way my shirt is pushed up.

Valentine must have disabled the cameras again. There’s no other explanation for how she could have risked coming here. My chest tightens with equal parts gratitude and fear. We promised to stay apart. Promised to be patient. The danger?—

God, the danger she put herself in just trying to “repay” me for the other day.

I needed no such repayment; my desire can wait until we’re free of this suffocating estate.

I force myself upright despite my body’s protests. Every movement feels like swimming through tar, but I need clarity. I need to think. If Julian discovers she came to my room…

The thought chills me more effectively than any cold shower. I must talk to her. I must make her understand that no matter how much we crave each other’s touch, we can’t risk exposure. Not yet. Not when we’re so close to escape.

First things first. Water for this desert in my throat. Clean clothes to face whatever fresh hell today brings. And somehow, some way, I need to meet with Aurelia without anyone noticing.

Because last night’s visit cannot happen again.

No matter how much we both need it.