Chapter 422

Chapter 422:

Dawn broke on the horizon as they approached the airport, painting the sky in streaks of gold and rose. A new day. A new life. A new name for Camille.

Yet some things remained unchanged in the growing light — the lily in his pocket, the photograph in his wallet, and the promise he’d whispered to a ghost in a moonlit room.

Sleep wouldn’t come for Alexander. Not yet. Perhaps not for a long while.

The Italian sun beat down like judgment from above, turning their clifftop villa into a white-hot crucible. Sweat beaded on skin, sheets soaked through, salt crystallizing on flesh as bodies moved together in urgent rhythm. Camille’s nails raked down Alexander’s back, drawing blood he barely felt. Her legs locked around his waist like a vise as he drove into her with punishing force. This wasn’t lovemaking. It was exorcism.

Camille’s cry echoed off stone walls as she arched beneath him, her eyes wide open, pupils blown, meeting his gaze with naked vulnerability that flayed him alive. For one blinding moment, there was only this: her body taking his, her trust complete, her surrender absolute.

Then the moment shattered, and the demons rushed back in.

Alexander collapsed beside her, chest heaving. Five days in Amalfi had burned away pretense. Here, they devoured each other hourly, moved together like animals, slept tangled in sweat-soaked sheets. The physical intensity should have purged his mind. Instead, it only heightened his torment.

“Jesus,” Camille whispered, her voice raw. “You’re trying to kill me.”

Her casual words stabbed through him. Kill. Death. Uncle Richard swinging from a beam, face purple, because Victoria Kane had systematically destroyed everything he had built.

Alexander rolled away, sitting up with his back to her. Scratches stung across his shoulders, physical pain that couldn’t begin to touch the war raging inside him.

“Where are you going?” Camille’s hand reached for him.

“Water,” he managed, his voice strangled.

In the bathroom, he braced himself against the cold marble, staring at a stranger’s reflection. Wild-eyed, hollow-cheeked, skin marked with evidence of Camille’s passion. Not the face of a newlywed in paradise. The face of a man possessed. His phone vibrated on the counter. Another message from Victoria: Latest scans show tumors shrinking faster than expected. Doctors are calling it remarkable progress. Miracle recovery possible. Miss you both. Call when you can.

Alexander’s fist slammed into the mirror, shattering his reflection into jagged pieces. Blood welled from his split knuckles as he staggered back, vision blurring. The injustice of it burned like acid. Victoria fighting her way back from certain death, while his uncle had been given no chance, no reprieve, no mercy.

“Alex!” Camille appeared in the doorway, naked and alarmed. “Jesus, what happened?”

He clutched a towel to his bleeding hand. “Slipped. It’s nothing.”

She pushed past him, grabbing his wrist and unwrapping the already blood-soaked towel. “This isn’t nothing. You need stitches.”

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