Chapter 98 Break Up With Him
Briar's POV
Lucian had just settled me back in my room when his phone rang. He pulled it from his pocket, his expression shifting as he glanced at the screen. "It's Leah," he said, answering immediately. "What's wrong?"
I couldn't hear her response, but I watched his face change, concern flickering across his features. "Slow down," he said. "What happened to Reginald?"
There was a pause, and then the line went dead. Lucian pulled the phone away from his ear, staring at it for a moment before looking back at me. "Leah said Reginald collapsed. I need to go check on him."
I said, "Wait, I'll come with you."
"No." His hand caught my shoulder gently, pressing me back down. "You just got out of the pool. Go take a hot shower first. I'll go see what's going on and come back soon."
I wanted to argue, but he was already moving toward the door, and I could see the worry in his eyes. "Fine," I said. "But call me if it's serious."
He paused at the threshold, turning back to look at me. "Your phone's dead, remember? I'll have a new one sent up later tonight. If you need anything before then, call the front desk and have them reach me."
"Okay." I waved him off. "Go. And bring me something to eat when you come back, I'm starving."
"Deal." He gave me a small smile, and then he was gone, the door clicking shut behind him.
I sat there for a moment, listening to his footsteps fade down the hallway, and then I stood and peeled off the damp towel, heading for the bathroom. The robe I had been wearing earlier was still soaked through, so I stripped it off along with my swimsuit and stepped into the shower, letting the hot water chase away the lingering chill from the pool.
By the time I finished, my skin was flushed pink from the heat, and I felt warm all the way through. I wrapped myself in one of the estate's plush bathrobes and padded back into the bedroom, rifling through my suitcase until I found a silk slip nightgown. I pulled it on, the fabric settling cool and soft against my skin, and then I grabbed a towel and started working it through my damp hair.
I was halfway to the vanity mirror when I heard a knock at the door.
I assumed it was Lucian, that he had forgotten something or come back to check on me, so I didn't bother looking through the peephole. I just crossed the room and pulled the door open, already starting to say his name.
But it wasn't Lucian standing in the hallway.
It was Julian.
His gray-blue eyes locked onto me immediately, and I watched as his gaze dropped to my neck, to the faint red marks Lucian had left there during our time in the pool. His expression didn't change, but something in his eyes did, something cold and sharp.
When he looked back up at my face, there was gold bleeding into his irises, the vertical slit of his wolf's pupil visible even in the dim hallway light. "I see I interrupted something," he said, his voice flat and cold.
I felt my pulse spike, my hand tightening on the edge of the door. I had been careless, too comfortable in the safety Lucian's presence had given me, and now I was paying for it. I took a step back instinctively, but Julian was already moving, his hand shooting out to shove the door open wider as he stepped inside.
"Julian, what are you—"
He slammed the door shut behind him with his heel, and before I could finish the sentence, he had his tie off and looped around my throat, the silk pulling tight enough to make me gasp. He used it like a leash, dragging me backward toward the bathroom, and I stumbled after him, my hands coming up to claw at the fabric cutting into my windpipe.
He kicked the bathroom door open and shoved me inside, spinning me around and forcing my hands together behind my back. The tie wound around my wrists with brutal efficiency, and then he was lifting my arms and looping the excess fabric over the showerhead, securing me in place with my back to him.
I tried to twist around, to see his face, but his hand clamped down on the back of my neck, fingers digging in hard enough to make me wince, and he forced my head down until my cheek was pressed against the cold porcelain edge of the bathtub.
"Julian, stop—"
His other hand reached past me and twisted the cold water tap, and icy water came pouring out, splashing up against my face and soaking into the front of my nightgown. I gasped at the shock of it, my body jerking instinctively, but his grip on my neck didn't loosen.
He leaned down, his mouth close to my ear, and when he spoke his voice was low and venomous. "Go ahead," he said. "Scream. Let everyone in this estate see you like this. Let your lover come running and find out what kind of mess he's gotten himself into."
I felt my throat close up, not from the tie but from the realization of what he was threatening. If I called for help, if Lucian came back and found us like this, it would turn into a bloodbath. Julian wouldn't back down, and Lucian wouldn't let him hurt me, and someone would end up dead.
So I stayed silent, my teeth clenched so hard my jaw ached, and I felt Julian's grip on my neck shift slightly, his fingers loosening just enough to let me breathe.
The cold water kept pouring, soaking through my hair and streaming down my face, and I forced myself to stay still, to wait for an opening.
It came when he moved his hand from my neck to reach for the tap, adjusting the flow, and I used the momentum to drive my heel back into his knee as hard as I could.
He grunted and staggered back a step, and I twisted my body, trying to pull my wrists free from the showerhead, but the angle was wrong and I lost my balance. I fell sideways into the bathtub, the cold water rushing over my face and filling my nose and mouth, and I choked on it, my lungs seizing as I tried to cough and breathe at the same time.
His hand was in my hair a second later, yanking my head up out of the water, and I gasped and sputtered, blinking water out of my eyes. He was leaning over the edge of the tub, his face close to mine, and his voice was shaking when he spoke.
"You lied to me," he said, and there was something broken in the way he said it, something raw and desperate. "You've been lying to me this whole time."
I stared up at him, water streaming down my face, and I felt something inside me snap. I was tired of being afraid, tired of pretending, tired of letting him control me with threats and violence.
"Yes," I said, my voice hoarse and ragged. "I lied to you. So what? What gives you the right to question me about it?"
His eyes widened slightly, the gold in them flaring brighter, and I pushed forward, my words coming faster now, fueled by anger and exhaustion and the bone-deep need to finally say what I had been holding back for so long.
"I can be with whoever I want, Julian. It's my choice, my life, and you don't get to control that. You don't own me."
For a moment, he just stared at me, and then his mouth curved into a smile that didn't reach his eyes. "Freedom?" he said, and the word sounded almost mocking coming from him. "You think you have freedom?"
Before I could answer, his hand was on the back of my head, and he shoved me down into the water again, my skull cracking against the bottom of the tub hard enough to make stars explode across my vision. His other hand came up to my neck, his thumb pressing against the mark Lucian had left there, rubbing at it with enough pressure to make the skin burn.
"Dirty," he muttered, his voice distant and detached, like he was talking to himself. "Too dirty."
I thrashed against him, my bound hands useless, my legs kicking out blindly, but he was stronger and he had leverage, and all I could do was hold my breath and wait for him to let me up.
When he finally pulled me out of the water, I sucked in air with a desperate, choking gasp, and his hand closed around my jaw, forcing me to look at him.
"Break up with him," he said, and his voice was calm now, almost conversational. "Do it before I really lose my temper."
I shook my head, water streaming from my hair, my vision blurred with tears I refused to let fall. "No."
His expression didn't change, but something in his eyes went dark and cold, and then he shoved me back under the water.
This time, he held me down longer. Long enough that my lungs started to burn, long enough that the edges of my vision began to go gray, long enough that I started to wonder if he was actually going to let me drown.
When he pulled me up again, I was coughing and retching, my body shaking uncontrollably, and all I could think about was Lucian's face.
I should have gone with him. I should have insisted.
Julian was still holding me by the hair, and I forced myself to focus on his face, on the gold bleeding through his eyes, and I used the last of my strength to drive both feet into his chest as hard as I could.
He stumbled backward, his grip on my hair breaking, and he hit the wall behind him with a dull thud. I collapsed back into the tub, coughing and gasping, my whole body trembling, but I forced myself to look up at him, to meet his eyes.
"You're pathetic," I said, and my voice came out raw and broken. "You think you can control me with a contract? With violence? You'll never have me, Julian. Never."
Something in his expression shattered, the last trace of humanity disappearing from his eyes, and the gold expanded until it swallowed the gray-blue completely. He moved toward me with terrifying speed, grabbing one of the folded towels from the rack and shoving it into my mouth hard enough to make me gag.
I tried to scream around it, but the sound came out muffled and useless, and then his hand came down in a sharp, brutal chop against the side of my neck.
Pain exploded through my skull, white-hot and blinding, and then everything went black.