Chapter 4

Aliana Gibson POV:

"You can't be serious," I whispered, the words catching in my throat. I looked at Dexter, searching for any sign that this was just a cruel joke, a threat meant to scare me into submission. But his face was granite. "Dexter, you know I can't go in there. The pollen... I could have an anaphylactic shock."

"Then I suggest you change your mind about the paella," he said, his voice utterly devoid of emotion. He was treating this like a business negotiation, a simple equation of action and consequence.

The bodyguards flanked me, their movements efficient and impersonal. They were just following orders. I backed away, my heart hammering against my ribs.

"Please, Dexter," I begged, my voice cracking. "Don't do this."

He simply nodded to the guards.

They grabbed my arms, their grips like iron vices. I struggled, but it was useless. They were twice my size, trained to handle resistance. They dragged me through the house, my bare feet scraping against the cold marble floors.

The glasshouse loomed before us, a beautiful, crystalline cage. As they forced the door open, the air hit me-a thick, sweet, suffocating cloud of fragrance. It was the smell of a thousand flowers, and for me, it was the smell of death.

They shoved me inside and locked the door behind me. The click of the bolt echoed in the sudden, humid silence.

The effect was immediate. My throat began to itch, a tiny tickle that quickly escalated into a raw, constricting tightness. My eyes watered, blurring the vibrant colors of the orchids and bougainvillea into a painful, impressionistic haze. My lungs felt like they were being squeezed, each breath a desperate, wheezing struggle for air.

Red, angry welts began to erupt on my arms, my neck, my face, itching with an intensity that was maddening. I clawed at my own skin, my nails leaving bloody tracks, but it did nothing to relieve the torment. It felt like my entire body was on fire from the inside out.

I stumbled through the narrow pathways, knocking over terracotta pots, my gasps for air growing more shallow, more frantic. I pounded on the glass walls, leaving bloody streaks on the panes. "Dexter! Please! Let me out!" My voice was a hoarse, unrecognizable rasp.

Through the glass, I could see the main house, lights blazing, life going on as normal. He was in there, probably comforting Bristol, while I was in here, suffocating.

Then I heard it. A low, ominous hum. It grew louder, a chorus of a thousand tiny wings. From the heart of a large, flowering hibiscus bush, a swarm of bees emerged. They had been drawn by the nectar, and now they were drawn to me, the thrashing, panicked intruder in their domain.

They descended on me. A primal scream of pure terror was ripped from my throat. Tiny, fiery explosions of pain erupted all over my body as their stingers pierced my skin. I flailed, trying to bat them away, but there were too many. They were in my hair, on my face, crawling down the collar of my robe.

The world began to spin, the edges of my vision turning dark. My last conscious thought was of Leo. My sweet, silent boy. I was going to join him. The pain receded, replaced by a strange, floating calm.

And then, nothing.

I woke up to the steady, rhythmic beeping of a heart monitor. The smell was no longer flowers, but the sterile scent of a hospital. An IV was taped to the back of my hand, feeding cool liquid into my veins. My skin was puffy and sore, but the itching was gone. I was alive.

The door opened and Dexter walked in. He looked tired, his hair slightly disheveled. He pulled a chair to my bedside.

"How are you feeling?" he asked, his voice low.

I stared at him, my throat too raw to speak.

He reached for my hand. I tried to pull it away, a reflexive, instinctual recoil, but his grip was firm. He held it, his thumb stroking my knuckles.

"The new gardener didn't know about the beehive," he said, by way of an explanation. An excuse. "Or about your allergies. It was a terrible oversight. He's been fired, of course."

He was rewriting history again, turning his deliberate act of cruelty into an unfortunate accident caused by a careless employee.

I found my voice. It was a dry, scratchy whisper. "What do you want from me now, Dexter?"

A flicker of something-was it pain? regret?-crossed his face before it was gone. "Bristol has been having nightmares," he said, his gaze fixed on our joined hands. "Ever since Leo... she's convinced his spirit is haunting her, blaming her for what happened. She's terrified it will harm the baby."

I couldn't believe what I was hearing. The sheer, unmitigated audacity of it.

"A psychic told her that the only way to appease the spirit is for the child's mother to personally go to the summit temple and pray for a charm of protection. You must walk up the thousand steps on your knees, from the base of the mountain to the main shrine, to show your sincerity."

My silence was a gaping wound in the room. He wanted me, after he had tried to kill me, to crawl up a mountain on my hands and knees to beg for a blessing for the unborn child of the woman who was responsible for my son's death.

"No," I whispered. "If she wants a charm, you go get it for her. You kneel. You pray."

"This is the last time, Aliana," he said, his voice pleading, almost desperate. "I know I have asked a lot of you. But do this one last thing for me. For the baby. Once Bristol feels safe, once the baby is born, I swear to you, I will send her away. I will give her enough money to live comfortably for the rest of her life, and you and I will never have to see her again."

The lie was so practiced, so smooth, I almost admired it. But I was done fighting. I was done saying no. Because I was beginning to understand that every new, impossible cruelty he demanded of me was just another nail in his own coffin.

The next day, his bodyguards drove me to the foot of the mountain. The stone steps stretched up into the clouds, a brutal, unforgiving staircase to the heavens. They watched as I fell to my knees.

The first step was agonizing. Sharp gravel bit into my kneecaps. By the hundredth, my knees were raw and bleeding. By the five hundredth, every upward movement was a symphony of torment. I thought of Leo. I thought of the revenge I would have. I kept going.

Hours later, I collapsed at the top, my legs a bloody, mangled mess. I crawled the last few feet to the shrine and accepted the small, red silk pouch from the monk. The charm. Her protection.

I was leaning against a pillar, trying to catch my breath, when my burner phone vibrated in my pocket. It was Isaac Griffin.

"Aliana," his voice was crisp, urgent. "I'm sorry to call you on this number, but I have news. Two pieces of news, actually. One bad, one good. Which do you want first?"

"The bad," I said, my voice weary. Nothing could be worse than what I had already endured.

"The bad news is that your marriage to Dexter Wolfe is a sham. He filed for divorce two years ago, using a loophole in your pre-nup that allowed him to file in a different state without your signature. The divorce was finalized eighteen months ago. Legally, Aliana, you are not his wife. You are just a woman living in his house."

The world tilted on its axis. Two years. For two years, I had been living a lie. I had been his partner, his lover, the mother of his child, but not his wife. All the pain, all the betrayal... it was even worse than I had imagined. The charm in my hand felt like a burning coal. It was all for nothing.

"My God," I whispered, a bitter, hysterical laugh bubbling in my throat. I leaned my head back against the cold stone. "Then what, in God's name, could the good news possibly be?"