The devotion grew into something darker. The obsession bled through.
His head fell back in a swoon, a guttural groan tearing from his throat. “Oh, my beloved Alina! How I miss you! How I long to see you, feel you, taste you again! Ours was a love of the ages—unsurpassed in all its glory!”
His fingers tightened around the pages, and suddenly, he was flipping through them faster.
The tenderness vanished.
His scowl deepened, his mouth curling into an impatient snarl, his eyes flashing like a predator surveying unfamiliar terrain.
“No!” His voice cracked through the air like a thunderclap.
Frenzied, he tore through the pages, nearly ripping the fragile parchment in haste. Sweat beaded on his brow, his breaths coming faster, his panic rising.
“It can’t be gone…” His hands shook, flipping forward, then back, searching—desperate.
Balthazar shoved the journal into my hands, his gaze wild and unhinged.
I turned the book over, frowning. I flipped it open. Closed it. Opened it again.
“Look there.” I pointed to a ragged spot along the spine. “It’s been tampered with. The stitching—it looks like someone hid something inside.”
Balthazar surged forward. “Open it. Quickly. Now.”
I patted my waist. “I don’t have my knife.” A lie. I always carried my dagger, but I had no intention of using it here.
“There’s a letter opener on my desk.” He jabbed a finger toward the oak desk in the corner.
I limped over, snatched the gold opener, and wedged the tip into thebook’s spine. It took careful maneuvering, the blade sliding back and forth against the old stitching until I finally pried it open. I wiggled a finger inside the narrow space.
Something was there.
A lump—small but solid.
I couldn’t pull it free, so I took the letter opener and carefully sliced it along the edges of the spine, peeling it apart.
A single, folded piece of paper tumbled onto the floor.
Balthazar’s hand shot out, snatching it up with frantic desperation. He unfolded the delicate parchment, his eyes skimming the words in silence.
Then, he began to weep.
Not the quiet, restrained grief of a hardened man—but the deep, agonized sobs of someone whose heart had just been torn open.
I hovered beside him. “What does it say? Tell me!”
His voice trembled as he read aloud.
“Oh, Alina… she writes: ‘I’m carrying Balthazar’s child. I’m in so much danger, I don’t know what to do. He’s going to come and take my baby from me. I must deceive Philip and tell him the child is his.”
A strangled sound tore from his throat—a wail so haunting, it sent a chill straight through me.
“Alina,” he choked, “you gave me the greatest gift I could ever hope for… and hid it from me.”
Tears streaked down his face, dripping onto his linen shirt, darkening the fabric in uneven blotches.
I swayed where I stood.
Balthazar—a father?
