CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Serafina
I woke in the darkness, the weight of consciousness settling over me like a familiar blanket. No startle, no gasp… just the quiet awareness that I wasn’t alone. The air in my bedroom had shifted, grown heavier with the presence of another.
I kept my eyes closed, my breathing even, but I was no longer asleep. I hadn’t been for some time now.
The sound of soft breathing, the subtle shift of weight on the armchair in the corner… I’d grown accustomed to these midnight visits.
Before I fell asleep tonight, I had been expecting this.
For the past week, I had been pretending to sleep while he watched me from the corner of my room. He thought he was stealthy, but how could I possibly remain asleep when such evil was suffocating the air in my room with his presence?
Tonight, I decided I’d had enough.
I opened my eyes and found him exactly where I knew he would be.
Adrian, my husband, lounging in the armchair as if he owned the very air I breathed.
His legs were stretched out in front of him, forearms resting casually against the armrests, looking utterly at ease and infuriatingly arrogant.
The moonlight caught the sharp angles of his face, casting half of it in shadow.
He was shirtless, his stomach carved with hard muscles and they tightened with every inhale, flexing with every exhale.
He had made himself comfortable in my sanctuary.
Our gazes locked across the darkened room.
“You’re not very subtle,” I said, my voice steady despite the rapid pounding of my heart.
His eyes, those piercing blue eyes that haunted my dreams, widened slightly. A flicker of surprise crossed his features before the familiar mask of indifference slid back into place.
“Did I wake you?” he asked, not bothering to deny his presence.
I sat up, letting the blanket fall to my waist. “No. I’ve known you’ve been coming here for days.”
The corner of his mouth twitched—almost a smile, but not quite. “Have you now, wife?”
“I’m not your wife,” I said quietly. “I’m your prisoner.”
“Prisoners don’t get their own rooms,” he replied, his voice rough. “Prisoners don’t get meals delivered to their doors. Prisoners don’t get to ignore their jailers for weeks on end.”
“That’s right. You’re not my jailer.” What a pompous ass. He thought just because I had been catered to that it meant my life was magically better? “You’re my tormentor.”
“Tormentor,” he drawled. “I like the sound of that. I did enjoy tormenting you while I was drinking up your sweetness and your juices were dripping down my chin.”
I slid from the bed, my bare feet touching the cold hardwood floor. The nightgown, sheer, white, and utterly useless for modesty, slid down my body, covering my legs but revealing everything else.
Adrian’s eyes tracked the movement of the fabric. They darkened as they traveled from my exposed collarbone to my shoulders, lingering on my chest where my nipples had hardened in the cool night air.
His gaze continued its slow, deliberate path down my body, pausing at the curve of my hips, lingering at the juncture of my thighs before moving down to my ankles and then slowly, torturously, back up to meet my eyes.
“Enjoying the view?” I asked, my voice laced with venom, defiance spiking through me.
“Immensely.” He didn’t even have the decency to look ashamed.
“Why are you here, Adrian? Why do you come to watch me sleep?”
He leaned back in the chair, the picture of casual arrogance that infuriated me. “I’m your husband. I can go anywhere in my own house.”
“Not my room. Not without my permission.”
His bare chest rumbled with a chuckle. “You gave me permission when you said ‘I do’ at the altar.”
I took a step toward him, my hands clenched at my sides. “I said ‘I do’ to a lie. You used me.”
“And yet here you are, still my wife.”
“Because I had no choice!” My voice rose, the carefully constructed composure I’d maintained for weeks finally cracking, anger flaring hot in my chest.
Now he was here, finally talking to me and I was mad.
I wanted to fight. I wanted him to know exactly what I thought of him.
“You took everything from me. My future, my dignity, my family’s respect.
I can’t go back to my family’s home; my father will never accept me back.
I have nothing to my name. I have nothing! ”
“I gave you my name,” he countered, rising from the chair in one fluid motion. “I gave you protection.”
“Protection?” I laughed, the sound bitter even to my own ears. “You’ve done nothing but torment me since the moment we met.”
He took a step toward me, and I stood my ground, refusing to be intimidated. “I’ve left you alone for weeks.”
“And yet you watch me sleep like some kind of creep. You didn’t leave me alone for my benefit or because it would make me feel better.
You left me alone because it was another one of my mind games.
Another way to torment me. To isolate me.
To hurt me with silence. So tell me, dear husband.
” My body shook, my emotions barely contained.
“Why do you come to my bedroom every night? Why do you watch me sleep?”
“Because I am intrigued… but now I find that you’re just a silly distraction.”
“Distraction?” I scoffed. “Is that what I am to you now? A distraction from your precious revenge? Oh how lucky of me.”
He moved so quickly I barely had time to react. One moment he was across the room, the next his fingers were wrapping around my throat, not squeezing but holding me in place as he pulled me against his hard body. His other hand tangled in my hair, tilting my head back.
“You talk too much,” Adrian growled, his breath hot against my face.
“And you don’t talk enough,” I spat back, my hands pushing against his chest. “You keep your secrets locked away while you destroy everyone around you. You pathetic lunatic—”
His lips crashed against mine, cutting off my words.
It wasn’t a kiss—it was an assault, a punishment and a claim all at once. Brutalizing.
His mouth moved against mine with bruising force, his tongue demanding entry. I struggled against him, my hands pushing harder, but he was immovable.
Heat bloomed where our bodies touched, a traitorous response that infuriated me more than his shameless arrogance.
I bit down hard on his lower lip, and Adrian hissed but didn’t pull away. Instead, he deepened the kiss, his tongue sweeping into my mouth, tangling with mine. The metallic taste of blood filled my senses—his blood, my doing.
The realization sent a dark thrill through me before my stomach clenched with a confusing mix of revulsion and desire.
Finally, he broke the kiss, stepping back just enough to look down at me. A thin line of blood trickled from the corner of his mouth. He wiped it away with his thumb, his eyes never leaving mine. “I didn’t know you were a biter.”
“How dare you?” I hissed, my voice trembling despite my best efforts to control it. “Don’t you ever kiss me again. You have no right!”
“You didn’t seem to mind it the night before our wedding,” Adrian drawled lazily.
My chest heaved with each breath. “That was different. I was—” I stopped myself, unwilling to admit the truth even to myself. I had been drugged, confused, not in my right mind.
“You were what?” he pressed, his hand still at my throat, his thumb now tracing my pulse point. “Wet? Eager? Begging for more?”
Heat flooded my face. “I was drugged. Someone gave me something that night.”
His expression hardened. “Are you accusing me again?”
“I don’t know what to believe anymore!” I pushed against him again, and this time he released me, stepping back. “Everything about you is a lie. How am I supposed to know what’s real? You’re confusing me and I feel like I don’t know who I am anymore.”
He towered over me, his cold, calculating presence filling the room and I hated how it made me feel so out of control. “You don’t know yourself at all, Serafina. You’ve spent your entire life being what others wanted you to be.”
“I know I hate you,” I said, my voice shaking with the force of my emotions. “I know I’m not your possession. I know you’re a monster who—”
“If you keep running your mouth like that,” he said, his voice dropping to a dangerous whisper, “you’re just begging to be kissed again at this point.”
He leaned into me again, as if to make true his threat, but I ducked away, my eyes scanning the room frantically. The coffee table, where Elena had left a fruit platter earlier, had a small paring knife beside it.
“Serafina,” he tsked darkly.
I lunged for it, wrapping my fingers around the handle and pointing it at Adrian.
“Stay away from me,” I warned, my hand trembling slightly.
He froze, his eyes narrowing as he looked from the knife to my face. For a moment, I saw something like admiration flash in his gaze.
“Careful, wife,” he said softly. “Knives are dangerous.”
“So am I,” I replied, surprised by the steadiness of my voice. “If you ever come near me again, I will kill you.” I waved the knife in his face, my lips curling with the threat.
“Never point a weapon at someone unless you’re prepared to use it.”
He took a step forward, and I raised the knife higher. “I mean it, Adrian. Don’t come any closer.”
“You won’t use it,” he said, taking another step.
“Did you think I would just lie down and accept my fate?” I spat. “Did you think I would be your obedient little wife, grateful for whatever scraps of attention you deigned to give me?”
He moved so fast, his arm shooting out, and he grabbed my wrist, twisting my arm and holding the knife to my throat instead.
My heart thudded and my pulse fluttered wildly, frightened and confused.
“You can’t spill blood, Princess.” He leaned closer, his breath feathering over my lips. His grip was hard and unyielding and he pressed the blade of the knife into my skin and I gasped. I felt the sharpness and then… a nick. “But I can.”
My throat bobbed with a swallow and I felt it… a single drop of my blood sliding down.
He let go of my wrist, and my arm dropped to my side, the knife sliding from my fingers and falling to the ground. Adrian slowly dragged his thumb over my throat, lingering over my pulse before he brought it to his mouth.
His thumb was coated with my blood and I watched, shocked and outraged, as he licked it.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
His lips twitched. “Sweet.” He licked the corner of his lips as if he wanted to taste the remnant of me, of my blood. “Careful, wife. Next time you try something like that I might be forced to spill more blood and that would be very sad. Because I happen to like your pretty throat.”
Adrian took a step back, a low chuckle vibrating from his chest. “A knife isn’t a toy. Don’t play with things you can’t handle, wife.”
My mouth opened, but I couldn’t form any words.
And my husband, he seemed very pleased with himself.
Fuck him.
My fist clenched at my sides.
Adrian sauntered away, leaving the room. The door closed behind him, but his mocking voice seemed to echo within the four walls of the room.
Don’t play with things you can’t handle, wife.
I was fucking done.
Done being my family’s pawn and Adrian’s victim.
Adrian made a mistake by marrying me and he would pay terribly for that mistake.
He thought he could use me to hurt his brother. He thought he could ruin me and I would just weep at his feet, like a naive girl. But I wasn’t naive. I wasn’t fragile.
Pure unadulterated hate filled my veins.
Rage consumed me.
I was a woman scorned and more dangerous than he could have imagined.
And if I had to kill my husband for his repeated ruthlessness, I would.
And it would be without regret.
Adrian said I couldn’t spill blood…
But there are other ways to kill a man than spill his blood, right?