The Devil's obsession with the Heiress

Chapter 156: Fear

Just as Gavriel continued to stare at her hand, it suddenly struck him.

She was wearing her black opera gloves underneath the ring.

He remembered clearly that she had taken them off right before he placed the ring on her finger, explicitly stating that she wanted the gem to rest directly against her skin rather than over the fabric.

Yet here she was, the gloves covering her hands once more.

He jogged his memory, recalling that she had already been wearing them when she had stepped out of the washroom, and he couldn’t help but wonder what had made her change her mind.

As the car pulled into the estate of Valentine Residence, his voice came out in a low murmur. "I thought you had discarded your gloves for the night."

The sudden question made her flinch, and she turned her head toward Gavriel in surprise. Her grey eyes met his, only to find him watching her with quiet curiosity.

Licking her lips lightly, she let out a soft chuckle that seemed just a little forced in Gavriel’s eyes.

"Oh, I thought it would be good to wear them. Weren’t they part of my look this evening?"

She offered him a small smile that failed to reach her eyes, causing him to stare at her even more intently than before.

As the silence stretched heavily between them, he noticed the way her fingers began to fidget slightly, as if panic were rising rapidly within her.

And that was the exact moment he tasted it.

Fear.

Cold, hard fear.

Ever since he had met Aliana, she had never shown him fear, or rather, it had never been directed at him. She was the most fearless woman who stood before the most feared man alive, and that was one thing that had remained unchanged no matter what. It was also what made her stand apart from every other woman he had ever met in his life.

It was something that attracted him to her... maddeningly so... alongside everything else about her. Her face, her voice, her presence, her body... every part of her seemed crafted to lure a beast like him towards her.

Yet here she was, shrinking into herself as dread tightened its grip around her heart, all because he had asked one simple, harmless question.

"Are you... afraid of me?" he suddenly asked in a low voice.

Her grey eyes widened ever so slightly at his question, and for a moment, he read her expression as though he had asked something painfully obvious.

The raw panic rolling off her body hit his senses next. Her nervousness was unlike anything he had ever sensed from her before, and the sheer intensity of it filled him with a deep sense of displeasure.

She let out a breathy, nervous laugh before shaking her head vehemently. "Why would you ask me something like that?" Her smile appeared strained, and then she said something that made him pause.

"Doesn’t everyone fear the great Gavriel Valentine?" A quick smirk tugged at her lips.

Just then, the car came to a smooth halt.

She instantly seized the cue, offering him another smile. "Oh, we’re here. Let’s head inside, shall we?"

She pushed the car door open, pausing to look back at him over her shoulder, her voice dropping into a sultry purr. "I’ll go get ready for the night and... wait for you, okay?"

When Gavriel merely continued to stare at her in dead silence, she seductively bit her lip before finally stepping out of the vehicle, hurrying toward the entrance where Winston stood waiting to greet them. He saw how she hurriedly asked Winston a question, causing the butler’s eyebrows to pull up in sheer surprise before she quickly brushed past him and headed inside.

A moment later, the chauffeur opened Gavriel’s door.

One would have expected him to be in a good mood after his engagement party, but the instant Winston’s eyes landed on his master, he felt a chill run down his spine. Because the dark, murderous expression twisting Gavriel’s face was deeply unsettling.

Winston’s face paled immediately upon seeing Gavriel wearing an expression so terrifying that the butler couldn’t remember the last time he had seen his master look this way.

As Gavriel walked toward him, the thick, suffocating aura leaking from his frame became almost physical. It felt like watching a god of war preparing for a bloody battle.

Winston wondered in a panic if something had gone terribly wrong at the engagement gala, or if his master had simply had an argument with his mistress.

Whatever the reason, both possibilities made alarm bells go off in his head.

Because this wasn’t merely a frightening Gavriel standing before him.

This was a dangerous Gavriel.

Dark clouds began to churn across the once-clear night sky, as though they were responding to the storm raging within him.

When Gavriel finally came to a stop in front of Winston, his cold voice cut through the night.

"Don’t let anyone come to the second floor, no matter what."

With that absolute command, he vanished inside before Winston could even open his mouth to reply.

Several seconds passed before another car rolled to a stop in the driveway. freёwebnoѵel.com

Winston’s eyes shifted toward Cillian, Nigel, and Jade as they stepped out and began making their way toward the mansion.

But upon seeing the ashen, horrified look on the usually stoic butler’s face, all three slowed to a stop.

Cillian raised a brow, casually asking, "And why do you look like you are seconds away from hitting your grave, Winston?"

"...."

At the remark, both Jade and Nigel whipped their heads toward him with expressions of complete disbelief.

They couldn’t believe he had just said that to an elderly man!

Cillian, however, ignored them entirely and waited for an answer.

Winston quickly schooled his expression before clearing his throat. "Master Cillian, I was instructed by Master not to allow anyone onto the second floo-"

Before Winston could even finish his sentence, a loud, thunderous crash reverberated through the air. The sound came directly from the second floor, causing all four of them standing by the entrance to flinch violently.

All of their heads snapped toward the second-floor windows of the mansion.

Just then, a violent crack of thunder echoed, and lightning split the sky, making the already ominous environment feel darker and far more menacing.

Jade, who had nearly jumped out of her skin at the thunderous crash, didn’t even realise she had grabbed onto Cillian’s arm as though he were the only thing anchoring her to the earth.

Unfortunately for Cillian, that wasn’t the only thing attached to him.

On his other side, Nigel had somehow latched onto his remaining arm with equal conviction, apparently having decided that if the world was ending, Cillian was the safest place to be.

"W-what was that?" Jade’s trembling voice sounded beside his ear.

Cillian didn’t answer right away. His expression hardened severely as his dark eyes remained fixed on the second floor.

Before he could offer a reply, the very ground beneath their feet began to shake. The tremors grew so intense within seconds, vibrating to the point it felt like the earth itself was preparing to split wide open.

"Earthquake!" Nigel yelped.

Meanwhile, Jade tightened her death grip on Cillian’s arm.

"Oh God! Ali and Gavriel are inside, aren’t they?" she cried. "What do we do?! We need to get them out!"

Winston, on the other hand, hurried over to a nearby lamppost and wrapped both arms around it with surprising speed, looking like a distinguished elderly man who had absolutely no intention of being launched into the atmosphere tonight.

The wind suddenly picked up with alarming force, whipping through the estate and sending leaves flying in every direction.

"Fuck," Cillian muttered.

The pieces had finally clicked into place.

With that first thunderous sound echoing from the second floor, he understood with absolute certainty that everything following it... the shaking earth, the lightning, the raging storm was the sheer, catastrophic repercussion of Gavriel’s wrath taking form.

And a display of power this terrifying could only mean one thing.

Something had gone terribly wrong with.... Aliana.