For a heartbeat, Amelie's only impulse was to run. To flee the mausoleum, the estate, this entire nightmare. But her feet were rooted to the spot.
Her eyes darted from Byron's unconscious form to the emergency call button on the wall near the door, a feature Mrs. Gable had pointed out on the first day.
Her hand, still trembling, reached out and slammed it.
Within minutes, the heavy doors burst open. A team of men in dark uniforms with medical kits swarmed in. They moved with a quiet, unnerving efficiency, loading Byron onto a gurney. No one spoke to her. No one even looked at her.
She was escorted out of the mausoleum and into the main manor, a sprawling mansion that made the tomb look modest. They led her to a private medical wing, a state-of-the-art facility that could rival any hospital.
As the medical team disappeared with Byron into a room, a woman with an elegant, severe beauty and silver hair swept into a perfect chignon approached her.
Eleanor Hyde. The family matriarch.
"My dear child." Her voice was rich and cultured, but her eyes, the same dark blue as Byron's, were sharp and assessing. She took Amelie's hands in her own. Her grip was surprisingly strong, her skin cool. "Tell Grandmother what happened."
Amelie's throat was dry. She recounted the story, editing on instinct. She told them about Cal's intrusion, his aggression, his desecration of the pod. She described the pod opening and Byron... waking. She left out the part about the nightly visitations. It was a secret too raw, too confusing to speak aloud.
In the hour that followed, a tense and suffocating eternity, the corridor outside the medical wing slowly filled. The whispers started first, then the sharp clicks of heels on marble. One by one, drawn by the impossible news that had ripped through the estate, the Hyde clan began to assemble, their faces a gallery of shock, disbelief, and poorly concealed calculation. The older man, his face a mask of fury and shock, was Lachlan Hyde, Cal's father. The other, with a colder, more calculating demeanor, was the second brother, Sterling.
Lachlan saw his son's name in the narrative and his face darkened. "Where is Cal?" he demanded.
"He left," Amelie said simply.
The assembled family members exchanged dark looks, their hushed, urgent tones filling the hallway like the buzzing of wasps.
Finally, a doctor emerged from Byron's room.
"He's awake," the doctor announced to the waiting family. "But his condition is... complex."
They filed into the room. Byron was lying in the bed, looking pale and diminished against the stark white sheets, but his eyes were open and lucid.
"I'm not dead," he said. His voice was weak, but it landed in the silent room like a grenade.
Lachlan and Sterling exchanged a look-shock, yes, but underneath it, a flash of profound disappointment.
Byron gave them a plausible, unbelievable story. The accident had induced a rare comatose state, mimicking death. The pod's life-support systems had kept him alive. Cal's shouting and his attempts to tamper with the controls, he claimed, had miraculously stimulated his nervous system, pulling him back to consciousness. It was a perfect, unverifiable miracle.
"However..." Byron paused, ensuring he had everyone's complete attention.
The doctor stepped forward, his expression grave. "Mr. Hyde is reporting a complete loss of sensation in his lower extremities. We'll need to run a full battery of tests, including an MRI, to determine the cause and prognosis, but the initial assessment is... concerning."
Paralyzed.
The word hung in the air, unspoken but understood.
And in the eyes of Lachlan and Sterling, a new light began to dawn. A flicker of hope. A living, breathing Byron was a threat. A Byron confined to a wheelchair? That was manageable.
Eleanor rushed to the bedside, her face a mask of theatrical grief. "My poor, poor boy! But you're alive! That's all that matters. It's God's greatest gift!" She stroked his face, her touch gentle, her words dripping with love. But as her eyes met Amelie's over Byron's head, Amelie felt a strange, unreadable chill pass through her, so quick she dismissed it as a trick of the light.
Byron's gaze shifted, finding Amelie where she stood silently by the door.
"This is Amelie Glass," he announced to the room. "As of three weeks ago, she is Amelie Hyde. My wife."
He held out a hand toward her. The gesture was weak, but the command was absolute.
Hesitantly, she walked to the bed and let him take her hand. His skin was warm.
"During my recovery," Byron continued, his eyes sweeping over his brothers, "she will act on my behalf. Any disrespect shown to her is a direct challenge to me."
The veiled threats in the room seemed to recede. Lachlan and Sterling pasted on smiles, stepping forward to offer hollow words of welcome to Amelie and concern for Byron.
Byron closed his eyes, a convincing performance of exhaustion. "Leave us."
It was a command. They filed out, murmuring amongst themselves, the shock giving way to calculation.
The door clicked shut, leaving Amelie alone with him.
He opened his eyes. The weakness was gone. The pallor was still there, but his gaze was sharp as forged steel.
"Now," Byron Hyde said, his voice losing all its manufactured frailty. "Let's talk about our marriage, Mrs. Hyde."
