Page 103 of His Eternal Claim

Fucking move.

I don’t waste another second. I back up, driving the heel of my combat boot directly beside the handle.

BANG.

The wood splinters.

BANG.

The frame cracks as the iron mechanism inside bends under the brutal force.

BANG.

The double doors burst inward, the influx of hallway light cutting through the pitch-black, suffocating gloom of the study.

My heart, a muscle I usually keep under lock and key, stops dead in my chest.

She is standing on the narrow stone ledge of the open window, her bare feet balancing on the precipice, the breeze whipping her simple cotton robe around her trembling thighs. Her eyes are wide, dilated into two hollow black inkwells, staring down into the sheer drop of the sea below. She is leaning forward.

No. No, you don’t. Not after everything.

“Zagreus…” she chokes out into the void.

“Selene!”

Her foot loses balance, and a broken scream rips from her throat as her body weight tips backward. I lunge, catching her by the fabric of her robe and the meat of her forearm, yanking her back over with force that sends us both crashing hard onto the rug.

She hits my chest and I wrap my arms around her waist, pinning her small frame against me, my own breath coming in gasps as I stare at the open window. There is nothing there. Just the wind. Just the black water.

What the fuck was she doing there?

“I’ve got you,” I growl against her hair, my fingers digging into her spine as if I can hold her soul inside her body. “I’ve got you, Dolcezza. Look at me.”

Her head rolls back against my shoulder, her eyelids fluttering frantically before her chin drops. Darkness swallows her whole, right in my arms.

“Get the doctor up here. Now,” I bark over my shoulder, not even looking back at Judas as I lift Selene’s frail weight into my arms.

“He’s already in the foyer, Vitale,” Judas replies. “He was on standby for your return from the operation.”

I don’t wait for him to finish; instead, I stride down the corridor, carrying my ruined wife back to our bedroom, kicking the door shut behind me. I lay her on the mattress. She looks so fucking tiny. Broken. The red scratch marks on her forearms are fresh, some leaking tiny beads of blood where her own fingernails dug into the flesh. Rage, hot and blinding, coats the back of my throat.

When the doctor steps in, his leather bag in hand, I don’t step back. I stand at the foot of the bed, my arms crossed over my chest, the dried blood of Vane Davenport’s men still flaking off my knuckles.

It takes twenty minutes of agonizing silence. The doctor checks her vitals, shines a penlight into her unresponsive pupils, and dresses the self-inflicted claw marks on her arms. I am losing my fucking mind watching. Just as he prepares a sedative drip, Selene’s chest hitches.

A sharp, ragged gasp leaves her lips as her eyes snap open.

Her head jerks toward the curtains, her small hands clawing at the duvet as she tries to scramble backward against the headboard.

“Where is she?” Selene whispers, her eyes darting to the bedroom door, then back to the glass. “Where did she go? She was right there… she had her hands on my ankles…”

I step into her line of sight, blocking her view of the window, and sit heavily on the edge of the mattress. I reach out, cupping her face, forcing her chin up so she has no choice but to look at me.

“Selene. Breathe,” I command softly, my thumb sweeping over her trembling bottom lip. “There is no one here. Just you, me, and the doctor.”

“No! No, you don’t understand!” She snaps her face away from my touch. Her nails dig straight into my blazer. “Crystella… she was in your study. She’s not dead. Her neck… it was bent backward, Zagreus. Her dress was covered in blood. She told me I should have died with them. She tried to push me out the window!”

My chest tightens.