Chapter 160

Chapter 160: Chapter 160

Lysander’s pov

The dark sedan pulled up to the shoulder of the logging road, its tires grinding wet gravel into mud.

The rear door clicked open from the inside and I scrambled through the freezing rain, ducked my head, and threw myself into the backseat, desperate to get out of the storm.

The door slammed shut, sealing out the howl of the wind. I turned, wiping rain from my eyes, and froze.

Darius was sitting in the corner of the leather bench. He wore a crisp, dark suit, a crystal glass resting casually in his hand, his crimson eyes gleaming softly in the dim interior light.

"Darius," I rasped, my heart slamming against my ribs. "You... you came yourself?"

"I prefer to oversee my investments personally, little bird," he purred, taking a slow sip of his drink as the driver pulled the heavy car back onto the dark asphalt.

"What did you do to me?" I demanded, my voice cracking with frantic energy. I leaned forward, gripping the leather seat.

Darius reached over, his long, pale fingers coming down flat against my lap.

"Be patient, Lysander," he said smoothly, not even looking at me. "We are nearly home."

Revulsion flared through my chest. The touch of his hand, the sickly-sweet smell of his cherry tobacco filling the enclosed car, it made my stomach roll.

"Get off me!" I snarled, driving my elbow toward his throat with every ounce of strength I could muster.

Darius didn’t even flinch. His hand shot up, catching my forearm mid-air in an iron grip. He squeezed just enough to send a dull, throbbing ache straight to my shoulder.

He slowly shook his head, his red eyes narrowing to sharp, dangerous slits.

"Behave yourself," Darius warned softly, his voice dropping into a dark, velvet rasp. "You came running to me for answers, Lysander. You start a fight in my car, and I dump you back out on the logging road for Drake’s hounds to find. Is that what you want?"

My jaw clamped shut. I breathed heavily through my nose, my whole frame trembling, but I forced my muscles to go slack. I had no leverage. I had no protection.

Darius released my arm with a smooth, dismissive flick of his wrist, pulling a silk handkerchief from his pocket to wipe his fingers.

The rest of the drive passed in a suffocating, dead silence.

The car glided through the massive iron gates of his estate, pulling up to the grand stone terrace. The driver opened the door, and the second my feet hit the marble foyer inside the house, I turned on Darius, my voice echoing violently off the high ceilings.

"Did you touch me?!" I screamed, my hands clenching into wet fists at my sides. "When I was passed out —when you put that collar on me—did you fuck me?!"

Darius tilted his head, a slow, condescending smile curling the corner of his lips. "Always so dramatic. The iron collar was a simple, elegant tool. It suppressed your strength, locked down your blood, and kept you quiet. Nothing more."

"You’re lying!" I screamed, my voice breaking as a sudden, sharp cramp pinched low in my stomach. I doubled over slightly, my arm wrapping tightly around my middle, my breath coming in shallow, panicked gulps. "My body is changing—I can feel it in my marrow! My veins are dark, I’m sick every morning, and Drake..."

My voice choked off. The image of Drake standing in the kitchen, his icy red eyes burning into mine, his hand crushing the collar of my sweater as he asked why I smelled like his enemy, flashed through my head like a physical strike.

"Drake smells you on me," I whimpered, tears hot and bitter, finally cutting through the rainwater on my cheeks. "He thinks I betrayed him. He thinks I gave myself to you. If you put some kind of dark blood poison in me, if you corrupted my essence, tell me now!"

Darius set his glass down on the desk with a soft, deliberate clink. He leaned back in his leather chair, watching my breakdown with a dark, patient fascination.

"You credit me with too much ambition, sweet boy," Darius purred softly. "I didn’t corrupt your blood. If your essence is shifting, if your body is altering itself, perhaps you should look to the ancient, overbearing pureblood who claims you as his mate. His blood is strong enough to rewrite your DNA from the inside out."

He paused, his eyes narrowing slightly as he took in the way my hand was pressed flat against my lower abdomen, shielding my core. A cold, knowing spark flickered across his dark irises.

My heart stopped dead in my chest.

"No..." I breathed, backing away a step, my head shaking in frantic denial. "No..."

"You ran all the way across the boundary in a mountain storm because you were afraid of a monster," Darius chuckled low in his throat, stepping around the edge of his desk with fluid, terrifying grace. "When the real monster is the suspicion rotting away inside Drake’s chest. He doesn’t trust you, Lysander. He never will. The moment he smelled me on your skin, he wrote your condemnation in his mind."

"I didn’t betray him," I choked out, my spine hitting the cold wood of the bookshelf behind me. "I didn’t..."

"It doesn’t matter what you did," Darius murmured, stopping five feet from me, his presence looming tall and dark in the dim room. "It matters what he believes. And right now, he believes you are unfaithful, unstable... and insane."

"I am not insane," I rasped through my teeth, my jaw tight, my eyes burning. "I saw him. I know what I saw."

"Ah, yes," Darius sighed smoothly, resting one hand in his pocket as he turned toward the shadowed alcove near the back wall. "The dark shape standing by the tree line. The face that haunts your dreams and makes Drake think your mind is fracturing into pieces."

Darius stopped near the entrance of his study, turning around slowly. A cold, condescending smile curved his lips as he looked at my soaked, shivering form.

"Your magic is spiking because your body is reacting to the ancient magic that claimed you," Darius said, sitting behind his desk. "Or perhaps... it is making room for a child. His child."

My breath hitched in my throat. I shook my head in frantic denial, backing away. "No..."

"It doesn’t matter what the truth is," Darius purred, leaning back in his leather chair. "It matters what Drake believes. And right now, he believes you are unfaithful, unstable... and completely insane."

"I am not insane," I rasped through my teeth, my jaw tight, my eyes burning. "I saw him. I know what I saw in the woods."

"Ah, yes," Darius sighed, resting one hand on the desk as he looked toward the dark, shadowed alcove at the back of the room.

Darius raised his hand, snapping his pale fingers once. The sharp sound cracked through the quiet room.

"Come out," Darius commanded softly. "Show our guest that his mind is as sharp as ever."

In the deepest shadow behind the heavy velvet drapes, a figure moved. A heavy, deliberate boot hit the polished floorboards with a dull, absolute thunk.

My entire body went paralyzingly stone-cold.

A tall, broad-shouldered man stepped out into the dim amber light of the hearth. He wore a dark coat, his chest rising and falling in slow, steady drags of air. He wasn’t a shadow. He wasn’t a hallucination.

He raised his head, the low light catching his sharp jaw, dark hair, and the familiar eyes that had haunted my nightmares for months.

Gideon.

My knees gave out completely. I collapsed, my hands slapping hard into the rug as my mind shattered into a thousand pieces.

"G-Gideon..." I rasped out, the name tearing from my throat like broken glass.

He was alive. Standing five feet in front of me, fully flesh and blood.

All those midnight panics. All those times I had pointed at the dark tree line, begging Drake to believe me when I said someone was watching the house. All those times Drake had held me, whispering that it was just trauma, that Gideon was dead, that my mind was playing tricks on me...

It was real. I wasn’t crazy.

"You..." I choked, tears streaming down my face as I looked up at Darius, my fingernails digging into the rug. "You kept him alive..."

Darius stood beside Gideon, placing a pale hand on the man’s shoulder, a dark, triumphant smile twisting his lips.

"I told you, Lysander," Darius purred softly. "You were never insane. You were just a pawn in a game you never understood."