The Billionaire and his Blood-Bride

Chapter Eight: Closer Than We Should Be

The cold from the cellar floor had crept up Lana’s spine, curling around her ribs like frost.

She sat with her back against the damp stone wall, arms wrapped tightly around her knees. The broken mirror lay shattered across the chamber, its shards glittering in the beam of her fallen flashlight like bits of a memory she couldn’t piece back together.

Somewhere above her, the house groaned.

Then — footsteps.

She stiffened.

A faint click. The sound of something mechanical shifting in the wall.

The door creaked open.

Light flooded the chamber, blinding after so much darkness. A figure appeared at the top of the stairs, haloed in dim gold.

Grey.

His eyes locked onto her — wide, searching, then narrowing with a sharp, familiar blend of concern and frustration.

“Lana,” he said, voice low and tight. “Why would you come down here alone?”

She didn’t answer.

She couldn’t.

He moved down the steps, two at a time, crouching beside her without hesitation.

“Are you hurt?” His hand reached toward her face, hesitated, then touched her cheek carefully, brushing away a smear of dust. “You’re freezing.”

“I was locked in,” she said, her voice trembling. “Someone was here. I heard them.”

Grey’s hand tensed against her jaw. “Who?”

“I don’t know. I saw… I saw something in the mirror. A girl. Me. Or someone who looked like me. She said things. Things I shouldn’t remember.”

She expected him to dismiss it. To say she was imagining things. But he didn’t.

Instead, he lowered his hand, let it slide down to her arm — warm against her skin.

“I believe you,” he said quietly.

She looked up sharply. “You do?”

“I’ve seen too much in this house not to.”

They stared at each other, the air between them no longer cold. No longer neutral.

“I thought I was losing my mind,” she whispered.

“You’re not,” he said. “They want you to think that. Whoever’s pulling the strings here — they’ve made an art out of erasing people.”

Lana looked down at the glass scattered across the floor. “She said there’s a second birth record.”

Grey went still.

Then he slowly sat beside her, letting his back rest against the stone wall, their shoulders nearly touching.

“I always wondered,” he said after a long moment. “Why I felt drawn to you. From the first time I saw your face… something clicked. Like hearing a song you forgot you loved.”

She smiled faintly. “You were distant. Cold.”

“I had to be,” he said, glancing over at her. “If I let myself feel anything, I might have remembered too much.”

She turned her head toward him. “And now?”

“I’m remembering.”

The silence that followed wasn’t awkward.

It was weighted.

His fingers brushed hers — not by accident.

She didn’t pull away.

Neither did he.

“You’re not like I thought you’d be,” she said softly.

“You’re everything I didn’t expect,” he replied.

Lana swallowed. “If the truth is as bad as it feels… if we’re connected somehow, by blood or fate or something else entirely…”

Grey leaned toward her, his voice dropping.

“Then I’ll find out. I’ll fix it. I don’t care what they buried. I care about you.”

The words hit harder than anything she’d expected. Not sweet. Not romantic in the traditional sense. But real. Raw.

And terrifying.

Because she wanted to believe him.

He turned toward her slowly, his face only inches from hers now.

Her breath hitched.

And for a moment, they weren’t heirs. Or ghosts. Or suspects.

Just two people caught in the same storm.

His hand lifted to her cheek again, thumb brushing just beneath her eye.

She didn’t stop him.

Their lips almost met—

—but he paused, eyes flicking to hers, waiting for something unspoken.

She hesitated.

Then whispered, “I’m scared.”

His voice broke around the edges. “So am I.”

And that was the closest they came to a kiss.

Not because of fear.

Because it mattered too much.

Grey rose first, helping her to her feet. His hand lingered around hers longer than necessary.

“You said there’s a second birth record,” he said, slipping back into himself. “I know where it might be. But we can’t go in daylight. My uncle monitors the library wing.”

“You mean the wing with the sealed filing room?”

He gave her a look. “You’ve really been busy.”

“I don’t like being lied to,” she replied.

A faint smile pulled at the corner of his mouth — something almost fond. “Then we’re on the same side.”

As they left the cellar together, Lana didn’t look back at the mirror.

But she felt it watching.

And for the first time since arriving at the estate, she realized she no longer wanted to run.

She wanted answers.

And him.

Maybe both would destroy her.

But she’d never felt more alive.