Chapter 4 - The Poisoned WellThe silence that followed Julian’s words was so absolute that the distant hum of traffic down on Fifth Avenue felt miles away.
For three terrifying seconds, my entire world tilted on its axis. The dark hair, the familiar eyes, the instinctive bond I had felt the moment I saw Willa’s face—was it all just a cruel coincidence, a biological illusion engineered by a psychopath who wanted to destroy me from the inside out?
Then I looked at Sloan.
Her face wasn't the face of a guilty woman caught in a web of lies. It was the face of someone driven to the absolute brink of despair, exhausted by months of relentless psychological torture.
She looked at Julian with pure, unmasked hatred.
“You lying, manipulative bastard,” Sloan hissed, her voice trembling with a fury so intense it made her whole body shake.
Julian smirked, folding his arms across his chest, playing the part of the calm, rational observer. “Am I lying, Sloan? Did you or did you not stay at my downtown brownstone for three weeks back in November when your rental lease fell through? Did I or did I not pay your medical retainers when Vincent’s divorce settlement lawyers locked your accounts?”
“You forced your way into my life!” Sloan shouted, tears finally breaking free, streaming down her pale cheeks while she clutched Willa tightly against her chest. “You intercepted my mail, you threatened to ruin my family’s business if I didn't let you ‘protect’ me, and you stalked me every single day after Vincent walked out!”
I didn't wait for Julian to answer.
In a blur of motion too fast for the human eye to track, I crossed the distance between us, grabbed Julian by the lapels of his expensive Italian suit, and slammed him backward against the reinforced glass wall of the private elevator foyer.
The glass shuddered violently under the impact. Julian’s breath expelled in a sharp, choking gasp, his silver-rimmed glasses sliding down his nose and clattering onto the marble floor.
“You piece of trash,” I snarled, my voice dropping into a low, terrifying growl that made my security guard take an instinctive step back. “You touch her? You stalked my wife?”
“V-Vincent…” Julian choked out, his hands clawing desperately at my wrists, his arrogant facade instantly shattering into raw, whimpering panic as he realized how close he was to death. “I’m… I’m just telling you the truth… she lived with me…”
“You’re lying,” I ground out, pressing my forearm against his windpipe until his face turned a mottled shade of purple. “I know Sloan. Even when our marriage was dying, she would never—never—touch a parasite like you.”
“Ask her!” Julian wheezed, his eyes bulging. “Ask her whose apartment she was hiding in when she went into labor!”
I looked back at Sloan. She was standing frozen near the hallway entrance, her face completely drained of color, her eyes wide with terror and shame.
“Sloan,” I said, my voice softening just a fraction, though the cold rage inside me was still burning white-hot. “Tell me he’s lying.”
Sloan looked down at Willa, then raised her swimming green eyes to meet mine.
“I stayed at his brownstone for two weeks in November,” she whispered, the words tearing out of her throat like broken glass. “I had nowhere else to go. My bank accounts were frozen by your corporate accountants during the preliminary asset freeze, my apartment had a severe mold infestation, and I was bleeding and terrified. Julian found me outside a pharmacy, offered me a guest room, and promised he wouldn't tell you.”
She broke off, a sob breaking her voice.
“The second I realized what he was doing—the second he tried to trap me and isolate me just like you did—I packed my bags in the middle of the night and ran. I haven’t spoken to him in four months, Vincent. I swear to God, I haven’t.”
Julian, catching his breath as I loosened my grip slightly, rasped out a bitter laugh. “She ran, yes… but she left behind a diary, Vincent. A little notebook where she wrote down every single date, every single doubt, every single night she spent crying in my arms wondering why you abandoned her.”
Before Julian could utter another word, I drove my fist straight into his jaw with enough force to crack bone.
The sickening crunch echoed through the foyer. Julian’s eyes rolled back, and he collapsed limp onto the marble floor, unconscious, bleeding from a split lip and a broken nose.
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I didn't even look down at him.
I turned my attention entirely back to Sloan, whose whole body was shaking so violently I was terrified she might drop our daughter.
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