Page 42 of Goldsin

“Damien?” I call out hesitantly.

No response comes, and the silence seems to mock my growing alarm.

The walls of the library close in around me. Shadowsdance ominously across the rows of books, cast by the flickering fireplace.

I can’t shake the feeling someone is watching me, lurking just beyond my line of sight.

Because I’m not alone. The ghosts of the sins inflicted on my mother are within reach.

Shaking the thought, I force myself to focus on my mother’s words. I finally have the missing pages of her diary—of her life.

The pages continue to paint a horrifying picture of Lucian Harrow’s depravity, and the more I read, the more certain I am that he played a bigger role in my mother’s death.

I try to ignore the cold dread pooling in the pit of my stomach as I absorb each harrowing detail, but the emptiness of the library gnaws at me. The silence becomes deafening as I strain to hear any sign of Damien’s return.

My discomfort is palpable, and it clings to me like a second skin, making it impossible to shake the sense of impending danger.

I lift my gaze as the dullest sound reaches my ears, whispered from the void. I stare at my empty surroundings, hoping against hope it’s Damien miraculously reappearing. But the library remains engulfed in silence, offering no comfort or reassurance.

So I continue to read. I can feel my mother’s pain, her shame and her fear, bleeding through the words.

“Master,”she wrote, describing her complete submission to him. But as the entries go on, her feelings for Lucian begin to evolve. “I thought he loved me. That I washis little gift. That’s what he called me when I pleasured him right,” she confesses in one passage.“But now I see the monster he truly is.”

The change in her perception of him is chilling, and it only serves to fuel my growing hatred for the man who took my mother away from me.

I want answers, justice, and most of all, I want Lucian Harrow to pay for what he did.

But these are just some of the pages in the envelope.

Maybe he didn’t kill my mother. Either way, from what I’ve read, he deserves to suffer at my hands, just as much as she suffered at his.

“Found you,” a voice growls behind me, warming my nape and startling me out of my thoughts.

As I turn toward the voice, the pages slip from my grip, fluttering to the floor like fragile leaves caught on a gust of wind.

“Julian.” The word whooshes out of my mouth, and my heart gets stuck in my throat as I scramble to pick up the letters.

I feel exposed under his piercing gaze—the same color as Lucian’s.

“Do you know the difference between me and you?” he whispers, stalking around me, his towering height forcing me to tilt my head up to maintain eye contact. “I’d chain you to keep you.”

I glance down at the red marks around his wrists.

“And once I do, I intend to exploit your body like an altar.Day and night.”

His last words slither down my body, goose bumps erupting in their wake.

I glare at him, my anger momentarily overpowering the ghastly effect of my mother’s words. “So what? You’ll pray for me?” I ask, clutching the letters tightly to my chest as if they’re a shield against his promises. But then I think better of it and swiftly hide them behind me, in the hem of my underwear.

“I’llworshipyou. On my fucking knees.”

I hear the shuffle of feet and spot Emeric Grimward, Julian’s best friend and the son of one of the Inferno Consortium families. The purple mask he was wearing before is now clutched in his grip. He’s standing a few steps behind Julian, arms crossed over his chest.

Julian doesn’t need to follow my line of sight to know who I’m looking at.

“I brought reinforcements in case you decide not to cooperate.”

His lips stretch at the way my eyes round.

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