Burning in Madness Chapter 04
My gaze drifted forward. On the reading stand lay a heavy, leather–bound diary.
I picked it up, hands trembling, and the frantic, jagged fountain-
pen scrawl crashed into my line of sight:
[I finally married her. But the addiction is only getting worse. If I touch her without gloves, I’m terrified I’ll tear her apart like a
rabid beast. If I let go, I’d lock her in this windowless room. I’d
make it so she sees no one but me.]
Manic laughter spilled through my fingers.
A tremor of absolute absurdity, tangled with a raw, intoxicating triumph, crawled up my spine. For the first time in our one–year
marriage, I could finally breathe.
There were no bullshit archaic family obligations. There was no
untouchable “first love” he was strictly saving himself for.
The “Target Subject” who had driven him to severe OCD, the woman he was terrified to touch for fear of losing his mind–was
me.
It was always me.
He’d rather skulk in this hidden room at midnight like a junkie,
breathing in the scent of my lingerie, than risk tearing off his
gentlemanly disguise.
I snapped the diary shut and returned it to the stand. If he loved playing the martyr so much…
Fine.
I’d put on a show guaranteed to shatter that pristine façade and drive him violently insane.
The next afternoon. The apartment was sealed tight behind blackout curtains, glaring ring lights illuminating the dark green velvet sofa.
I was wearing a shockingly skimpy black lace bodysuit. A few
thin straps barely held everything together across my chest,
leaving my long legs completely exposed to the air.
“Perfect, Chloe… let that silk ribbon drop another inch.”
Julian, a notoriously flirtatious, “hands–on” fashion photographer–and the sole reason I’d paid double his rate today–clicked away like a madman.
“Your waist is too tense, darling.”
Lowering his camera, Julian dropped down, wedging one knee between my thighs. His hand flattened brazenly against my bare waist, his thumb sliding suggestively along my obliques.
I didn’t pull away. Instead, I curled my lips into a red smirk, arching my back languidly into his touch.
Ding-
The private elevator doors slid apart without warning. Julian’s hand remained planted on my skin as I looked past the blinding ring lights.
Arthur stepped out. Midnight–black suit, dark gray cashmere coat. Home early.
The air vanished from the room.
Through the dim lighting, I watched his gaze lock onto the scene: his half–naked wife, and a man kneeling between her legs.
He stopped dead, paralyzed like a man frozen in ice. Behind his
gold–rimmed glasses, his pupils dilated into abyssal voids, surging with a murderous wrath.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Rothwell,” Julian said, completely oblivious.
He didn’t even bother removing the hand resting on my waist as he cheerfully broke the suffocating silence. “Do you mind if I
borrow your gorgeous wife for a few intimate shots?”
I leaned back lazily against the velvet cushions, watching Arthur with amused detachment, my heart hammering wildly against my ribs.
*Get mad,* I willed him. *Break his arm. Rip off that hypocritical
gentleman’s skin of yours.*
Arthur stood rigid. The violent tick of his jaw betrayed him, but then he closed his eyes. When they snapped open, that apocalyptic madness had been locked away behind a terrifying force of will.
“Not at all.” His voice was ice.
Without a second glance, he walked straight to the marble wet bar. “Make sure she looks stunning. My wife deserves nothing
but the best.”
His feigned indifference choked my rising excitement. A lunatic
terrified he’d lose control from a mere brush, and he was still playing this game?
I stared daggers into his stiff, retreating back. A venomous, malicious desire for revenge spiked in my chest.
“Julian,” I purred, my voice dripping with honey. “I actually think the focal point of this piece is the legs.”
Right to Arthur’s back, I deliberately hiked a long leg up, resting
it wantonly on the edge of the sofa. “Would you help me
unfasten the garter clasps? They’re digging into my skin.”
Julian leaned half his body weight over me, his hand sliding
eagerly toward my knee.
A few yards away, Arthur was pouring whiskey into a heavy
crystal tumbler. The ice hit the glass with a sharp, clear clink.
My breath caught.
Julian’s fingers traced upward along my thigh, his thumb hooking casually onto the cold metal clasp. Just as he applied pressure, about to lift the intimate lace- Crunch.
A sickeningly harsh shatter tore through the dead silence.
Julian flinched so hard he practically jumped, snatching his
hand back as if he had been burned.
I whipped my head around.
By the bar, the whiskey bottle was rolling across the floor. Arthur hadn’t dropped his glass–he had crushed the heavy crystal tumbler to dust with his bare hand.
Glass shards bit deep into his flesh. High–proof alcohol mixed
instantly with the metallic stench of blood. Crimson droplets
slid down his knuckles, smacking the pristine white marble.
Ignoring his mutilated hand, he turned with agonizing slowness.
Behind the gold frames, his last thread of sanity had utterly snapped. The gentlemanly disguise was gone, replaced by the bloodcurdling instinct of a beast.
His gaze bypassed me entirely, locking onto the photographer in a death grip.
“Take your filthy hands off her.”
It wasn’t his usual cold arrogance. It was a guttural, animalistic rasp dragged from the depths of his chest.
Bleeding with every step, he stalked toward the sofa, bringing a suffocating aura of pure, unadulterated violence.
“Grab your fucking camera.”
Arthur stopped abruptly, his shadow swallowing Julian whole.
“And get out. Before I cut off the hand you just put on my wife.”