All Chapters of The Billionaire and his Blood-Bride: Chapter 81
- Chapter 90
182 chapters
Chapter Eighty-One : The. Remnants
The first shot tore through the air, sharp enough to rip the breath from Lana’s throat. Grey’s hand was already on her back, pushing her down the slope behind the ruin.“Keep low,” he hissed.Rain slicked the earth to mud, turning every step into a struggle. They half-ran, half-fell through the underbrush until the sound of boots splashing behind them made Lana glance over her shoulder.Another shot cracked. Bark exploded from a nearby tree.“Grey—”“Don’t stop.”Branches clawed at their coats. The forest seemed to close in, alive with the echo of pursuit. Grey’s mind was running faster than his feet — every gunshot, every shout behind them tightening the snare of recognition.That SUV wasn’t random. It was the same model the Foundation used for field retrievals years ago. Whoever was in it knew exactly where to find them.He cursed under his breath and veered left, pulling Lana after him. They broke through the treeline into a gully where a narrow stream glimmered under the moonlight
Chapter Eighty Two - Smoke and screens
Grey looked miles away, his expression shuttered. She wondered what ghosts he was seeing — and how many of them had her name.She stood, pacing the narrow space. “You said there was another property — the one your uncle kept off records?”He nodded slowly. “The coastal plant near Ridgeport. It burned two years before the mansion.”“The wrong fire,” she said under her breath.Grey looked up. “What?”“Seraphine’s message. You’re looking in the wrong fire. That must be it.”The thought crystallized between them, electric and terrible.“If she’s right,” Grey said, “then the night my mother died wasn’t the start — it was the cleanup.”“Then the first fire,” Lana whispered, “might’ve been where I came from.”He froze. The truth was like gravity — pulling them both toward something they weren’t ready to face.⸻They moved before dawn. The Foundation teams wouldn’t linger long once the rain washed away the trail, but Grey knew better than to trust silence.They cut through the forest until th
Chapter Eighty-Three — The Woman in the Smoke
For a heartbeat, no one moved. The wind clawed through the ruined hall, scattering ash and paper scraps that glimmered in the flashlight’s beam. Lana couldn’t breathe. The words—You were—hung between them like a verdict. Grey’s hand trembled slightly on the pistol. “Explain,” he said, voice low but fraying at the edges. “What the hell does that mean?” Seraphine stepped closer, her boots sinking into the mud that had pooled through the cracks in the floor. She pulled back her hood, revealing a streak of gray through her dark hair, and eyes that had seen too much to still be afraid. “You were the first fire,” she repeated. “The test case. The reason everything else had to burn.” Lana’s mouth opened, but no sound came out. She shook her head. “No… I don’t—” “You don’t remember,” Seraphine said softly. “They made sure of that.” Grey lowered the gun an inch, uncertainty flickering in his eyes. “Who made sure?” Seraphine looked at him. “Your uncle. The Foundation. The ones who built
Chapter Eighty-Four – The Ash and the Sea
The cliffs bled into gray as they descended toward the coast. Wind tore through the air, sharp and wet with sea spray, tugging at Lana’s coat as she stumbled over the rocks behind Grey. Every muscle in her body screamed, but she didn’t stop. Neither of them spoke; the world around them had gone hollow — only the sound of their breath, the surf, and the far-off hum of engines fading behind them. They didn’t look back. The lighthouse shrank into the distance, swallowed by the mist. A thin trail of smoke still drifted from the ridge, curling into the dawn like a question that refused to die. By the time they reached the shore, Lana’s lungs burned. The sand was dark, coarse, mixed with ash — a graveyard of what had once been driftwood. An abandoned fisherman’s hut stood nearby, its door hanging crooked. Grey tested the frame before pushing it open. Inside, it smelled of salt, rust, and rain. A small stove sat in one corner, a pile of nets rotting in another. He shut the door behind
Chapter Eighty-Five – The Vault Beneath the Tide
The fog thickened again as they followed the narrow trail north. The sea growled below, waves smashing against the cliffs like something ancient trying to claw its way free. Every few minutes Grey would glance over his shoulder, scanning the horizon. He didn’t say it aloud, but Lana knew — he was waiting for headlights. For pursuit.They kept moving.By the time they reached the old pier, the light had turned cold and thin. The wind carried the stench of salt and iron. A rusted chain-link fence marked the edge of the property, half-collapsed from years of storms. Beyond it, half-buried in sand and weeds, stood a low concrete structure with a slanted roof — the Foundation’s old annex.Grey knelt, testing the gate. “Locked,” he muttered, then kicked once, hard. The metal gave way with a squeal.Inside, the air was still. Dust and sea rot mingled in the dim light. Broken crates lined the corridor, their stenciled labels faded — ARCHIVES. INVENTORY. CONFIDENTIAL.Lana trailed a hand along
Chapter Eighty-Six – The Quiet Between Storms
The sea calmed by dawn. The fog had thinned into a low, ghostly veil that clung to the water’s surface, stretching endlessly toward the horizon. The trawler drifted in silence, its small engine humming a weary rhythm.Grey stood at the bow, face drawn, eyes fixed on the horizon. Behind him, Lana sat on the deck with the metal case open across her lap. The reports had dried overnight, though the edges curled like burned parchment. Every line she read deepened the pit forming in her stomach.Project Reclamation. Subject 47-R. Her name where his once had been.She had stopped trying to make sense of it. There was no neat answer to the question of what she was — not fully human, not fully stolen. Something made. Something carried forward in fire.Grey’s voice broke through the quiet. “You should rest.”She looked up. “I can’t. Every time I close my eyes, I see that room. The ash. That vial.”He turned from the sea, his expression unreadable. “You don’t have to understand it all tonight.”
Chapter Eighty-Seven – Below the Ashes
The air changed the moment they stepped below.Cold, close, metallic — the kind of silence that remembers too much. Their footsteps echoed down the spiral stairwell, each one a soft thud swallowed by the dark. Grey’s flashlight cut a narrow beam ahead, catching glimpses of rusted pipes and damp concrete walls.Lana’s hand brushed the railing. It was slick with condensation, faintly trembling under her touch. “How far down does this go?”“Farther than it should,” Grey muttered.They reached a landing where the walls widened into a tunnel. Cables hung loose from the ceiling, and an old ventilation fan creaked above them, moving just enough to stir the dust. The air smelled faintly of burned paper and salt.At the tunnel’s end stood a steel door. A small, shattered panel beside it flickered once, then died. The remnants of a red warning light pulsed weakly in the dark — a heartbeat refusing to stop.Grey knelt to inspect the lock. “Someone’s already been here,” he said. “It’s been forced
Chapter Eighty-Eight – The Shore of What Remains
The sea had turned rough by the time they reached the coast again. Waves crashed against the blackened rocks, foaming white under a bruised morning sky. The storm from the night before hadn’t fully passed — it lingered at the horizon like an unmade decision.Lana stood at the edge of the cliffs, the wind tearing at her coat, the salt stinging her face. Behind her, Grey pulled the trawler’s tarp over the few things they’d managed to save from the observatory. The wooden box — Seraphine’s final trail — sat between them like a secret too heavy to open again.“This is where she meant,” Lana said quietly. “Where the sea meets the ash.”Grey joined her, scanning the shoreline below. The black sand was streaked with pale driftwood and debris from the ruined pier. “There’s a cave system beneath the rocks,” he said. “Old smugglers used it decades ago. If Seraphine wanted to hide something here, that’s where it would be.”Lana adjusted the strap of the case across her shoulder. “Then that’s whe
Chapter Eighty-Nine – The First Fire
By the time they reached the estate, the world had changed its color again.The sun was setting — not gold, but the washed-out hue of old bone. Smoke from distant fields drifted across the hills, soft and gray, like ghosts keeping vigil over the ruins below.Grey parked the truck on the ridge overlooking what was left of his family’s ancestral home. The estate sat silent, gutted by time and weather — a charred skeleton of stone and ash. Ivy had begun to reclaim the walls, twisting through shattered windows and burnt beams.Lana climbed out first. The air smelled of rust and wet cinders. “It feels like it’s still burning,” she murmured.Grey joined her at the edge of the slope. His jaw tightened. “It never stopped.”They started down the narrow path leading toward the main courtyard. Every step seemed to echo against the quiet — the crunch of gravel, the distant call of a crow. The once-grand archway loomed ahead, its crest half-collapsed. Faded letters etched above the gate still read
Chapter Ninety – The Burning Sky
By morning, the estate was nothing but embers and whispers.Ash drifted across the coastline, mixing with the mist rolling in from the sea. What had once been the Foundation’s heart was now a hollow pit carved into the cliffs, still smoldering, the last testament of a century-old lie finally collapsing under its own weight.Lana and Grey had found shelter in the ruins of an old chapel half a mile down the shore. The pews were rotted, the altar long fallen, but its stone walls still held firm against the wind. The first light of dawn filtered through a stained-glass window fractured by time — the image of a saint’s face now split in two.Lana sat near the window, staring at the small data drive resting in her palm. The casing was scratched, blackened at the edges, but it had survived. She hadn’t slept. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw Seraphine’s face illuminated by the rising fire.Grey entered quietly, carrying two mugs of something that resembled coffee. “It’s instant,” he sa