Diana didn't remember the Uber ride back to Manhattan. She didn't remember walking through the lobby of her building, ignoring the night concierge's concerned look, or riding the elevator up to the penthouse.
The only thing she felt was the cold. It had settled deep in her bones, a freezing chill that the apartment's heating couldn't touch.
She walked into the bedroom. The sheets had been changed. The blood was gone. It was as if the nightmare had never happened. But the ache in her body told her otherwise.
She didn't bother taking off her dress. She didn't bother taking off the diamond necklace that still felt like a noose. She collapsed onto the pristine white bed, curling into a tight ball, and let the darkness take her.
The fever started within hours.
One moment she was shivering so hard her teeth chattered; the next, she was burning up, kicking off the blankets, her skin slick with sweat. She drifted in and out of consciousness, trapped in a hazy purgatory between reality and memory.
The dream came for her, pulling her down into the past.
She was twenty-three again. Her hair was longer, her eyes brighter, free of the shadows that lived there now. She was standing in the study of the Wilcox estate, wearing a simple sundress, her architectural portfolio tucked under her arm.
Her father, Authur Wilcox, stood before her. He looked older than she remembered, the lines around his eyes deeper, his shoulders carrying a weight she couldn't see. But his eyes-his eyes were full of a desperate, fierce love.
"Diana, I need you to listen to me," dream-Authur said, his voice grave. "I've made a deal. It's the only way to protect you."
"Protect me from what, Dad?" she asked, but the scene shifted before he could answer.
She was in the Alston estate now, standing in the imposing library. Montgomery Alston sat behind the massive mahogany desk, a cigar in his hand. He looked at her not as a person, but as a problem to be solved.
Authur was there too, standing across from Montgomery. He looked defeated, smaller than she had ever seen him.
Montgomery slid a thick manila folder across the desk. "The terms are agreeable, Authur. The debt will be wiped clean. The Wilcox Group will have our backing. And in return, she marries Curtis."
Diana tried to scream, to tell them she wouldn't be traded like a commodity, but she had no voice in this memory. She was just an observer, watching her own fate being sealed.
Authur reached for the folder. His hand was trembling. He looked at Diana, and a single tear tracked down his weathered cheek. "I'm sorry, sweetheart. I'm so sorry."
He took the folder. And then, to Diana's absolute horror, Authur Wilcox-a man who had never bowed to anyone in his life-bowed his head to Montgomery Alston.
"I accept," Authur said, his voice breaking.
The memory fast-forwarded. She was in a white dress, standing next to Curtis at the altar. He looked at her with the same cold indifference he always wore, like she was a business acquisition, a line item on a spreadsheet.
But the dream wasn't done with her yet. It pulled her deeper, into a secret she had tried so hard to forget.
She was a fly on the wall now, watching her father and Montgomery in a private room years before the wedding. The atmosphere was tense, the air thick with unspoken history.
"Montgomery, you owe me," Authur said, his voice hard, devoid of the defeat she had seen later. "Twenty years ago, when the Alston Group was under siege by Castellano's hostile takeover, who stepped in? Who risked everything-his own capital, his own reputation-to back your play?"
Montgomery's face was unreadable, but he nodded slowly. "You did, Authur. The Wilcox Group saved us."
"I didn't just save your company," Authur pressed, leaning forward. "I saved your family from ruin. And I never asked for anything in return. Until now."
"What is it you want?" Montgomery asked.
"I want your word," Authur said, his voice thick with emotion. "If the day ever comes when I can't protect my daughter, you will. You will give her the protection of the Alston name. You will make her family."
Montgomery studied him for a long moment. "And if Curtis objects?"
"He will do as he's told," Montgomery said firmly. "You have my word, Authur. A life for a life."
The dream dissolved into a swirl of color and sound. Diana was back in the bed, thrashing against the sheets, the fever raging through her body.
She understood now. The marriage hadn't been a business deal. It hadn't been a desperate attempt by the Wilcox family to climb the social ladder, as the tabloids claimed. It had been a father's ultimate sacrifice. Authur had cashed in a twenty-year-old debt, a favor that could have saved his own company, to buy his daughter a shield.
He had known what was coming. He had known the walls were closing in on him, and he had used his only lifeline to save her.
The weight of that love was suffocating. It pressed down on her chest, making it impossible to breathe. She was living in a gilded cage, wearing diamonds she hated, enduring a husband who despised her, all because her father had loved her more than his own freedom.
"Dad," she sobbed in her sleep, the tears soaking into the pillow. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."
The dream shifted again, the shadows growing longer, the colors fading to gray. A darker memory was rising, one she had buried so deep she thought it would never surface.
She saw her father's office. The day after the wedding. The door bursting open.
