Chapter 270. A Fight for Her

Chapter 270. A Fight for Her
Rhea rose calmly to her feet and looked at him with cool indifference. “Sorry. My leg cramped just now, and I accidentally kicked you in the knee. I’m this clumsy, so I don’t think I’d make a very good actress, and I’d make an even worse girlfriend. Otherwise, I’m afraid you’d better buy insurance early.”

After saying that, Rhea turned and went to stand beside Jacintha, taking up a protective stance in front of her.

Lucien kept clutching his leg for a long while before he could sit up straight again. His shin still throbbed, yet when he looked toward Rhea, he burst out laughing.

“Raphael’s bitch is vicious as hell. I like it!”

Right then, the lounge door was shoved open.

Raphael stepped inside.

He had arrived so quickly that the chill from outside still clung to his coat. His silver hair was slightly disheveled, and the handsome face that usually carried such calm composure had lost it completely. His blue eyes locked onto Jacintha at once, and then he rushed toward her and pulled her tightly into his arms. His embrace was so fierce that she felt as though her body might be crushed into his.

Even though he was holding her so tightly she could barely breathe, Jacintha still did not push him away. Instead, she wrapped her arms around his broad back just as tightly, burying her face against his solid chest. A line of tears slipped down her cheek. Finding this safe place to hide made her feel overwhelmingly at peace.

“Don’t be afraid... I’m here now... Jacintha, don’t leave me again, all right?”

Raphael’s voice trembled, touched with a madness neither he nor Jacintha noticed. And where she could not see, his pupils suddenly darkened into a deep blood-red.

Only after a while, when she truly felt she could not breathe anymore, did Jacintha pat Raphael on the shoulder. “Raphael, I’m about to suffocate.”

At that, Raphael hurriedly let her go. Both hands stayed on her shoulders as he looked her over once more, as though making sure she was truly still unharmed.

Jacintha smiled at him, her hand gently cupping his face. “I’m fine. Rhea pulled me away in time.”

At that moment, Lucien’s flippant voice rang out, slicing through the romantic atmosphere. “That crazy woman was one of Sharon’s obsessive fans. Mr. Wulfhart’s ex-lover really did have a far-reaching influence. If I had been the one ‘helping’ Jacintha back then, she wouldn’t have ended up in so much danger.”

Lucien stressed the word “helping,” as if to remind Raphael how he had treated Jacintha in the past—and to remind him that it was precisely because she had become entangled with him that she had nearly lost her life again and again.

It struck directly at the darkest memory Raphael most wanted to bury, and it became the key that unlocked the madness he had been suppressing with all his strength.

Sure enough, Raphael’s gaze darkened at once. His fist flew forward so fast that no one had time to stop him. Lucien tilted his head and avoided most of the force, but the corner of his mouth was still clipped, drawing a bright streak of blood.

“Raphael!” Jacintha cried out.

Lucien sprang to his feet, wiping the blood from the corner of his mouth. A mocking glint flashed in his eyes. “Did I hit a nerve, or have you just gone insane?”

“Shut up! What happens between my wife and me is none of your business!” Raphael roared, murderous intent thick in his voice.

Jacintha stepped forward and grabbed his arm. “Calm down!”

But it was as though something heavy were pressing down inside Raphael’s mind. The image of Jacintha nearly having her face ruined, then the sight of her sitting close to Lucien as though they were about to kiss, overlapped and twisted together into a searing heat that burned through his thoughts.

Raphael’s chest ached as if it were being carved open with a blade. He felt the urge to shift into his wolf form, to smash everything around him to pieces. Yet the last scrap of reason left in him kept dragging him back, stopping him from doing something beyond repair.

Lucien was not the sort of man to stand there and take a beating, either. He swung back at Raphael. Rhea rushed over at once and pulled Jacintha behind her, shielding her from getting hurt in the brawl between the two men.

Jacintha seized Rhea’s arm and said urgently, “Stop them, now.”

But Rhea did not answer. She only stared fixedly at Lucien as he deftly evaded Raphael’s attacks.

Her brows drew tightly together. Even in human form, when Raphael’s fighting power was cut in half, an ordinary man still should not have been able to stand against him. And yet Lucien did not seem disadvantaged in the fight at all.

Combined with how often he had been appearing at Jacintha’s side lately, Rhea began to sense that something was very wrong.

In the chaos, Raphael threw another punch. Lucien stepped back, his back slamming hard against the edge of the table before he fell to the floor, his face tightening in pain. He should have been able to dodge that blow easily, but from an outsider’s point of view, it looked as though he had already tried to stop the fight and Raphael had deliberately gone after him anyway.

Just as expected, Jacintha tore herself free from Rhea’s grasp and strode straight up to Raphael. Her eyes were red, whether from panic or anger, it was impossible to tell.

“Have you lost your mind?”

Raphael looked at her, his breathing still ragged. “I—”

“He helped shield me from that obsessive fan’s attack!” Jacintha’s voice trembled. “If it hadn’t been for him, I might have been hurt. And the first thing you did when you got here was start a fight with him?”

Raphael clenched his fists. “He was trying to drive us apart on purpose! He had bad intentions!”

“Do you still not trust me, Raphael?” Jacintha looked straight at him. “I’ve explained it to you so many times. You’re the only one I love, but you keep doubting me. And now you’ve even hurt an innocent person. Lucien clearly wanted to stop just now, and you still kept hitting him! He’s only human—how could he possibly withstand a punch from you? Do you have to kill every male around me before you’ll finally be satisfied?”

Raphael had never seen Jacintha look at him like that before. There was no softness left in her eyes, no gentle coaxing, none of the patience she had always shown him. Now there was only anger and disappointment.

Every single word she spoke cut into his chest like a knife.

“Jacintha...” His voice dropped, the restraint inside him on the verge of breaking. “I’m not saying you betrayed me, but that brat Lucien isn’t innocent either. He was the one provoking me just now, and he never had any intention of backing down. I can feel it—he has bad intentions toward you. You need to stay away from him.”