Chapter 10
Seraphina
My throat still burns from the wine as I storm through the Devereux mansion, my heels clicking against the marble. Every person I pass either stares openly or quickly averts their eyes—the mark on my neck might as well be a brand. In a way, it is.
“Get out of my way,” I snarl at some random Society bitch who doesn’t move fast enough. She scurries aside like I’ve threatened to stab her.
Maybe I should. Maybe I should have grabbed one of the daggers and just start slashing my way through this nightmare. Starting with Lucien’s fucking throat.
My brother’s throat. Jesus Christ.
The nausea hits me again, a wave so strong I have to pause and brace myself against the wall. My fingers leave smudges on the pristine cream wallpaper, and I take a sick pleasure in that tiny act of defiance. Let them clean up after me. Let them remember I was here.
I need to get out of this house before I completely lose my shit.
The ceremony ended twenty minutes ago, and the guests are still milling about downstairs, drinking champagne and pretending they didn’t just witness some archaic blood ritual that binds me to my own goddamn half-brother.
The thought makes my stomach heave again.
I push away from the wall and continue down the hallway, following the twists and turns I remember that will lead me back to the entryway. When I was younger, I thought the Devereux mansion was just a big fancy house, not the fucking lair of the devil himself.
The grand staircase appears ahead of me, and I practically run down it, desperate for fresh air and escape. I’ve almost reached the massive front doors when a hand closes around my upper arm, yanking me to a stop.
“Where do you think you’re going?” Lucien’s voice is low, dangerous, wrapping around me like barbed wire. It bites into my flesh, and I can feel myself suffocating by it, by him.
I try to jerk free, but his grip is unbreakable. “Home. Let go of me.”
“Home?” He laughs, the sound echoing in the cavernous foyer. “You are home, Little Sinner.”
“Fuck you,” I hiss, aware that we’re drawing attention from nearby guests. “This isn’t my home, and you’re not my keeper.”
His fingers tighten painfully. “That mark on your throat says otherwise.”
I reach up to touch the spot where his blood dried on my skin. It feels warm, almost pulsing. “This sick game you’re playing doesn’t change anything. We’re fucking siblings, Lucien.”
“Half-siblings,” he corrects with a smirk that makes me want to slap him. “And I don’t give a fuck. You’re mine now.”
“I am not yours.” I spit the words at him, not caring who hears. “I never will be. Now let me go before I scream.”
Lucien’s eyes darken as he leans in close, his breath hot against my ear.
“Scream. Go ahead. See what happens, Seraphina.” His voice drops even lower, a dangerous rumble that vibrates through my bones.
“We both know no one here will do shit. They wouldn’t even if I wasn’t a Devereux.
But your scream?” He pulls back just enough to look me in the eyes, his lips curling into a predatory smile.
“It might just turn me on. Do you want to tease me? If so, by all means, go ahead.”
I open my mouth, ready to let loose the most blood-curdling shriek this mansion has ever heard, but something in his gaze stops me. The naked hunger there, the way his pupils dilate as he watches my lips part. He’s not bluffing. The sick fuck would probably get off on my public meltdown.
“You’re disgusting,” I whisper instead, my voice shaking with rage.
“And you’re mine,” he counters, his grip loosening slightly as he guides me toward a side door. “Marked and Chosen. I’ll keep saying it until it sinks in. Deal with it.”
Before I can form a retort, he’s pulling me through the door and suddenly we’re outside.
The October air hits me finally, cool and crisp and so fucking welcome after the suffocating atmosphere inside.
I gulp it down in desperate breaths, feeling it fill my lungs and clear my head.
It washes over my flushed skin, and I hate that it’s exactly what I needed.
I hate even more that Lucien somehow knew that.
He stands back, watching me with those predator eyes as I center myself. The garden is dimly lit by small path lights, casting everything in shadows and silver. Away from the crowd, away from the ceremony, I feel like I can finally breathe again.
“Better?” he asks, and there’s something almost gentle in his tone that throws me completely off balance.
I open my mouth to tell him to go fuck himself, but he cuts me off.
“Come on,” he says, gesturing toward the driveway where I can see his sleek black car waiting. “I’ll take you back to your dorm room.”
I blink at him, suspicious. “Just like that? You’re letting me go?”
His laugh is low, dangerous. “I didn’t say I was letting you go, Little Sinner. I said I’m taking you back to your dorm.”
“Why?” I narrow my eyes, searching his face for the trap. “What’s your angle?”
“No angle.” He shrugs, the movement fluid and controlled like everything else about him. “You need space to process. I’m giving it to you.”
I don’t buy it for a second. Lucien Devereux doesn’t do anything without a calculated purpose.
“I can get there myself,” I finally say, my voice steadier than I feel. “I don’t need you to drive me anywhere.”
He laughs, low and almost sinister, his eyes glinting in the moonlight. “Yeah, no.”
“I’m not getting in a fucking car with you,” I snap, crossing my arms over my chest. The mark on my throat pulses like a second heartbeat, reminding me of what just happened inside.
“Yes the fuck you are,” he says, stepping closer until I can smell his cologne again, “or we can go back inside and I’ll just lock you in my childhood bedroom.” His eyes rake over me, hungry and possessive. “Would you like that? Would you like to be locked in my room at this pretentious ass house?”
His voice drops even lower, cruel and cutting. “Maybe I’ll even show you the rooms that belong to the Devereux daughter my mother never had...” He tilts his head, watching the pain flash across my face. “My father had her though, didn’t he? And yet she never got to live in this house.”
The words hit me in the vilest way. I take a step back, my hands curling into fists at my sides.
“Now you’re being cruel to inflict the most damage, Lucien,” I whisper, hating how my voice breaks. “And no, I fucking don’t want to see your room or any other room in this place. I want to be gone.”
“Then get in the car,” he says, gesturing toward the sleek black Aston Martin idling at the curb. “Because those are your only two options tonight.”
I stare at him for a long moment, weighing my choices. Go back inside to that suffocating house full of people who just watched me get branded like cattle? Or get in a car with my psychotic half-brother who seems determined to own me?
“Fine,” I mutter, stalking toward the car. “But just so we’re clear, this changes nothing. I still hate you.”
“Noted,” he says, and I can hear the smirk in his voice without having to look.
The seat molds to my body as I slide in, trying not to pay too much attention that he’s holding the door open for me. Trying not to read into the gesture, and feeling sick to my stomach that despite everything, I like it.
He leans across me, his arm brushing against my chest as he reaches for the seatbelt. I swat his hand away hard enough to make a slapping sound.
“Uh, I think the fuck not,” I snap. “I can buckle my own seatbelt. I’m not a child.”
His eyes meet mine in the dim light of the car, and a slow, predatory smile spreads across his face. He doesn’t move back, just hovers there in my space, suffocating me with his presence.
“Your stubbornness has always been the most attractive thing about you, Seraphina,” he says, his voice a low rumble that I feel more than hear. “I’m going to enjoy watching you break.”
Before I can respond, he grabs the seatbelt and clicks it into place, his knuckles deliberately grazing my hip. Then he’s sliding into the driver’s seat, closing the door with a soft thud that sounds like a prison cell locking.
“You’ll be waiting a long fucking time,” I mutter, staring straight ahead as he starts the engine. “I don’t break for anyone, especially not you.”
Lucien pulls away from the mansion, the tires crunching on the gravel driveway.
“We’ll see,” is all he says, but the certainty in his voice makes my skin prickle.
We drive in silence for several minutes, the darkness of the night broken only by the occasional streetlight washing over us. I keep my eyes fixed on the road ahead, refusing to look at him, though I can feel his gaze sliding over to me every few seconds.
“Stop fucking staring at me,” I finally snap. “Watch the road before you kill us both.”
“Would that be so terrible?” he asks, his voice casual like we’re discussing the weather. “Dying together in a twisted wreck of metal? Very Romeo and Juliet of us.”
“Except they weren’t fucking siblings,” I spit out.
He laughs, the sound dark and rich in the confined space of the car. “Half-siblings. And technically, they were cousins in the original story.”
“Jesus Christ, are you seriously trying to justify this...whatever this sick obsession is?” I gesture between us, my anger building. “It’s fucked up, Lucien. Even for you.”
He doesn’t answer immediately, just takes a sharp turn that throws me against the door despite the seatbelt. When he speaks again, his voice has that dangerous edge that makes my stomach clench.
“You think I don’t know it’s fucked up? You think I wanted this?” His knuckles turn white on the steering wheel. “Finding out you’re my sister should have killed whatever this is between us. It didn’t. If anything, it made it worse.”
I stare at him, speechless. My mind is racing, trying to process everything that’s happened tonight. The ceremony, the marking, the revelation that we’re related—it’s too much. I feel like I’m drowning in information, in implications, in the weight of what this means for both of us.
“What do you want from me?” I finally ask, my voice barely audible over the purr of the engine. “What’s your endgame here?”
“I want what I’ve always wanted,” he says simply, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “You.”
“This is insane,” I whisper. “You know that, right? We can’t—I can’t—“ I shake my head, struggling to find words. “Look, I’ll play along with this fucked-up charade in public. I’ll be the good Society girl you’ve Chosen. No one has to know about...the other thing.”
Lucien lets out a harsh laugh that fills the car, making me flinch. “You think you can pretend? You think you can act like the perfect Chosen girl in public and then what—ignore me in private?”
“Something like that,” I mutter.
“Bullshit.” He takes another turn, faster than necessary. “We both know you can’t act that well, Seraphina. And people already know.”
“Know what?” I ask, though I’m afraid I already know the answer.
“That you’re my sister,” he says bluntly. “Cassian and Asher, for example. There are whispers that I have a sister. I know you’ve heard them.”
My stomach drops as I remember the conversation I overheard in the bathroom weeks ago. The three bitches, huddled around the sinks, their voices low but clear enough.
This is my fucking nightmare, all of it is one nightmare after another piling up.
“It’s the only thing I have to offer, Lucien.” Just let me get through this semi-intact so I can fucking graduate. Maybe I can go talk to Vincent, maybe he can make this whole thing just go away.
“We’ll see, Little Sinner. We’ll see.”