Chapter 4

The air in the room went completely still.

I stared into Julian's eyes, and my heart missed a beat.

"What are you saying?"

Taking a deliberate step backward, Julian threw his hands open in surrender, wearing a triumphant smirk.

"Think about it. Why did Aurora end up at that gallery that night? Why did every single fire suppression system in the building fail? Why were there no signs she even tried to escape?"

Because..." Julian enunciated every single word, "I was the one who injected her with succinylcholine.

Succinylcholine. A powerful paralytic. It shuts down every voluntary muscle in the body—including the muscles that control breathing—while leaving the mind completely awake and aware.

My mind went blank with a sudden rush, as if ten thousand needles were simultaneously piercing my temples.

"You killed her?" My voice came out as barely a sound.

"If I can't have something, no one gets to." Julian's face came apart—whatever mask he'd been wearing dissolved, and what was underneath was not a person. "She was about to marry you. I went to her. I told her I still loved her. I begged her to come back to me. And she slapped me across the face and said I disgusted her."

"So I let her stay perfect. Preserved. I watched the fire reach her. I watched until—" He made a slow, satisfied exhale. "It was beautiful."

"Ahhh—!!!"

I let out a scream of sheer despair and rage, throwing myself at Julian with reckless abandon.

I'll kill him! I'm going to rip him to shreds!

I was just on top of him—my hands finding his collar, my fists finding his face. One hit, two, three. His nose broke. Blood poured down over his mouth and he was laughing, laughing—

"Hit me harder! Hitting me won't bring her back!"

"Lucien, stop! You'll kill him!" Iris had her arms around my waist from behind, throwing her whole weight into pulling me away.

"Let go of me! I'll kill him!" My eyes were bloodshot, and my sanity had completely shattered.

And then Julian's hand moved. He had found the scalpel on the floor. He came up with it in one motion and drove it toward my stomach.

"Lucien—!"

Iris let out a piercing scream and shoved me violently aside, throwing herself in front of me.

Shhhk—

The sickening sound of a blade sinking into flesh rang out, deafeningly loud in the dead silence of the living room.

Time seemed to stand still in that very moment.

I just stood there, staring blankly at Iris. Julian's scalpel was buried in her left shoulder. Her white nightgown flooded red from the wound, a vivid crimson bloom spreading through the fabric.

Julian stood frozen. He clearly hadn't expected her to step in front of me. He yanked the blade free and stumbled back.

Iris made a low sound and folded.

"Iris—" I caught her before she hit the floor. Her blood was on my hands, warm and real.

It was the first time I had called her by her real name.

She looked up at me. Through the face that belonged to Aurora, she gave me a faint, ruined smile.

"Lucien… I'm sorry… I lied to you…" Her voice was getting fainter. "I just… didn't want to let go of the warmth you gave me…"

"Stop talking. I'm taking you to the hospital." I pressed my hand against the wound. My eyes were burning. "Don't talk. Hold on."

I hated what she had done. I hated the face she was wearing and the lie she had built around it. But the soups she had left simmering for me. The light she kept on when I worked late. The way she used to look at me—like I was enough, like I was everything— That had all been real.

I was already trying to get my arms under her to lift her when the back of my head exploded in white pain.

A wave of agonizing pain washed over me, and the world around me began to spin wildly.

In the last second before I lost consciousness, I saw Julian standing over me, a bronze ornament in his hand, looking down at us the way you look at something that is already finished.

"Since you're so devoted to each other," he said, "I'll send you both down together."