“EVERYTHING OKAY IN HERE?”
Lucian looked up at me from his desk, rubbing the tiredness from his eyes as he nodded. “I’m just going through my accounts.”
He’d been going through them since his return this afternoon, but I wasn’t going to say anything about it. This situation was stressing him out, and he wouldn’t stop until he figured out what was going on.
I leaned against the doorframe. “Any leads yet?”
His brows pinched together as he glanced at the screen, and even though he shook his head, I suspected he’d uncovered something.
“Not anything I can prove,” he said wearily.
“I’m worried.” My hands felt like iron as they wrapped around me. “I don’t know if I stirred something up by writing that book.”
Lucian blinked, shaking himself from his thoughts as he focused on me. “Come here.”
I walked around the desk, and he pulled me onto his lap, leaning me into his chest as he kissed my cheek. I closed my eyes, wishing for more. Since his return, he still hadn’t kissed me on the lips. He said he believed me, but tension lingered between us, and I knew he was still protecting himself in case his worst fears about me turned out to be true.
“I’m here, Gypsy,” he said. “I’m not going to let anything happen to you or my son.”
I laid my head against his shoulder and breathed in his scent. It hit me all over again how much I missed him, and when I wrapped my arms around his shoulders, I didn’t want to let him go.
“I’m not the person I was before,” I whispered. “I would never want to hurt you, Lucian. Never.”
He closed his eyes and leaned into me. “I know.”
“If you know, then you can’t hold back from me,” I argued. “I need you. All of you.”
His grip on me tightened as he dragged his nose through my hair and nuzzled against my neck. “I know, pet. I’m sorry. I’ve been an asshole, and for the first time in my life, I don’t know how to fix it. I don’t know how to make things right.”
“Trust me,” I said. “Just trust me and be with me… the way things were before. That’s all I want.”
His fingers brushed over my face, and our eyes locked as he tilted my head up to meet his. “I’m trying, but I know I need to do better.”
The vulnerability in his voice gave me the encouragement I needed to press my lips against his. His fingers curled into my nightgown, and he didn’t fight me. He gave into me, and before I knew it, we were clawing at each other’s clothes, frantic with a need that manifested in him fucking me roughly over the desk until I came twice.
He buried himself inside me and emptied his cock, grunting out his release before he squeezed my ass in his hands.
“I missed this,” he murmured.
I laughed, turning over my shoulder to meet his eyes. “Me too.”
“We should enjoy it while it lasts,” he said somberly. “While I’m still feeling up to it.”
He pulled away and cleaned himself up, helping me right my clothes before I propped myself on the desk and observed him.
“What will the radiation be like?” I asked.
“The procedure itself isn’t bad,” he said. “It’s like an X-ray. It only takes a few minutes, but the setup to make sure they target the right areas is what takes the longest.”
“And how long will that last?”
“I’ll need to go five days a week for a few weeks most likely.”
He didn’t look like he wanted to think about it, but the guilt of knowing that I wasn’t there when he needed me the most consumed me. He felt like he’d missed everything with the pregnancy, but I’d missed one of the hardest things he’d ever had to do.
I reached out and stroked his arm. “What was the chemo like?”
“It was about as pleasant as you’d probably imagine,” he answered dryly. “I felt like shit. I was tired and sore and a moody asshole for the duration of it. It’s probably best you missed it.”
I looked down at the floor. “I don’t feel that way. I feel like I should have been there, and I hate that I wasn’t.”
Lucian tipped my chin up, brushing his thumb over my cheek. “I’m glad that you weren’t. I wouldn’t have wanted you to see me like that.”
“But that’s my job,” I argued. “I’m your wife.”
His lip tilted at the corner. “Well, you’ll be here for the radiation. So don’t feel like you’ve missed out on everything.”
“I wanted to Google it,” I said. “But I was too afraid I would just freak out if I did.”
“It’s probably better that you didn’t,” he admitted.
“Will you get sick?”
“I’ll be at an increased risk of infection. There will probably be side effects, but it’s nothing I can’t handle.”
He sounded like Superman when he said that, and I smiled because I didn’t know if he was aware that I thought he really was.
“Whatever happens…” I took his hand in mine. “We’ll get through it.”
“There’s something else you should know,” he said.
“What is it?”
Lucian sighed. “You’re still so young. I honestly never thought when I married you that this would be anything more than a contract. I never planned for it to happen this way. I just wanted to take care of you.”
“I know.” I dipped my head. “But what does that matter now? We fell in love. I don’t care about the age difference.”
“You don’t now,” he said. “But you should have everything you want out of life.”
“I already do.”
Lucian looked away quietly, before he worked up the courage to tell me what was bothering him so much. “Gypsy, I probably won’t be able to give you any more children. The chemo and radiation—”
“I don’t care.” He looked up at me, and I pressed his hand against my belly. “We have this one. That’s all we need.”
He didn’t look convinced, but I knew it was something only time could fix. He thought I would change my mind later and resent him for it, but I knew that I wouldn’t. I never thought I’d be married, and I was. I never thought I’d have any kids, and I was. Lucian had given me more than I’d already dreamed of; he just didn’t know it.
He kissed me, pulled away, and then kissed me again. “You should get to sleep.”
“Aren’t you coming?”
“Soon,” he promised. “I just want to finish going through these transactions.”
I squeezed his hand. “Don’t be too long.”
At first, I thought I was dreaming. The sound of Lucian’s voice was muffled and distorted by what I could only assume was a roaring river.
“Gypsy! Wake up, baby.”
This time, his voice carried, and I coughed, keenly aware that something was wrong. So very wrong.
Dense smoke filled the bedroom, and I blinked as I tried to process what I was seeing. Flames had consumed the frame of the bedroom door, and behind them, I could barely make out Lucian’s shape.
My first instinct was to move toward him, but I stopped when the heat penetrated my skin and shook me back to my senses.
“Oh my God.” I couldn’t breathe. The smoke was so thick, I was practically choking on it. “What do I do?” I screamed.
“Gypsy, I need you to listen very carefully,” Lucian yelled. “Grab the bedroom door and slam it shut. Then go to the bathroom and get some towels wet and wrap one over your face. Breathe through your nose. Do you understand?”
“What about you?” I shrieked.
“Put the other wet towels beneath the door crack if you can. You have to be quick, okay? Then get down on the ground and wait for me. I’m going to find a way out. I’m going to break the window so I can get you out, baby.”
I shook my head, terrified. “Lucian—”
“Slam the door,” he begged. “You have to do it now. There isn’t much time.”
I didn’t want to slam the door. I felt like if I did that, I would never see him again. “Promise me it’s going to be okay,” I cried.
“I’m coming for you, Gypsy,” he promised. “Remember what I said.”
I remembered that he assured me he would do anything in his power to stay here with me, and right now, he was putting himself at risk to try to get me out.
“Slam the door, baby. Do it now.”
I looked through the flames, trying to make out his face. “Come back for me.”
“I’m going to be right there,” he insisted.
“I love you.” The words came out in a choked whisper as I reached for the handle and swung the door with all the force I could muster.
Tears streaked down my face as I covered my mouth and ran to the bathroom, soaking as many wet towels as I could carry. I followed Lucian’s instructions, wrapping one around my face and bringing the others to the door. It was already shaking in the frame, flames slipping out from beneath, and I couldn’t push the towels in with my hands, so I flung them against the crack and hoped they would hold.
Then I got down on my knees and crawled over so that I was next to the window, remembering what Lucian said about breaking the glass. It would be the only way in or out, since everything in the house was controlled with electronic locks.
I tried to stay calm, breathing slowly, biting down on the towel so I wouldn’t inhale through my mouth. Within seconds, there was a commotion outside the window, and I tried to pop my head up to see if it was Lucian.
“Stay down,” the voice yelled. “I’m breaking the window.”
I covered my head and waited as the sound of a hard object splintered against the window. It reverberated through the frame but didn’t break. For what seemed like the longest seconds of my life, I listened as the window shook but didn’t shatter. It was reinforced glass. Lucian took his security seriously. Nobody was supposed to get inside, but it also meant without unlocking it, I couldn’t get outside either.
I gulped breaths through the towel, desperately eyeing the bedroom door as it began to burn from the other side. It wouldn’t be long now. This was no accident. Whoever had tried to kill us came back to finish the job.
A loud crack whistled through the air, and I jolted as glass finally fell to the tile beside me. I tried to stand, but my legs felt like jelly, and when Ace crawled through the window and pulled me up, fear gripped my heart. I tried to ask him about Lucian, but he wouldn’t let me.
“Keep the towel on your face,” he told me. “Hold on.”
He lifted me into his arms and passed me out the window onto the roof of the first story. Ace crawled out behind me, and I looked around, desperate. “Where is he?”
He ignored my question, positioning himself onto the ladder he’d placed and instructing me to follow him down. All I wanted to do was find Lucian, but logically, I knew I couldn’t unless I got down safely. I climbed down the ladder after him, and he helped me onto the grass.
“We need to get away from the house.” He tried to lead me around the front, down the driveway, but I resisted.
“Goddammit.” He grabbed me by the arm. “Do you want me to help him, or not?”
“Yes!” I screamed. “Please.”
“Then you have to fucking do what I say. Go stand with your sister and don’t move. Do you understand?”
I nodded, gulping in breaths of fresh air. Birdie met me at the front of the house, her face frantic. “It’s okay,” she said. “It’s going to be okay.”
But it wasn’t. Because I kept staring at the side of the house where Ace disappeared. The entire thing looked like it was engulfed.
“I can’t do this again.” I shook my head. “I can’t do this again.”
I almost collapsed, but Birdie grabbed me and helped me down to the ground. “Just sit there and try to breathe. Ace will find him.”
She sounded so confident, but I wasn’t. Terror had reached its sharp tendrils inside my chest and wrapped around my heart. It was taking too long. Something was wrong. “Where is he?” I demanded. “Where the fuck is he?”
“I’m sorry,” a quiet voice spoke from the shadows. “But Lucian’s not coming.”
My heart leapt into my throat when I turned to find Nolan behind us, a pistol in hand.
“Nolan?” I croaked. “What are you doing?”
He looked right through me. “Stand up.”
Birdie stepped in front of me, and I scrambled to my feet as he pointed the gun right at her face.
“Birdie!”
“I don’t want to shoot her,” Nolan said. “But I will if you don’t do what I tell you.”
“Fine.” I held up my hands. “Fine. Just tell us what you want.”
He pointed back in the direction that we came from. “Walk.”
I grabbed Birdie’s arm and tried to pull her along with me, but she shook her head. “He’s just going to kill us if we follow him.”
Nolan cocked the gun, and the desperation in his eyes told me he was serious.
“Birdie, stop it.” I took her hand in mine and tugged her forward. “Just do what he says.”
She squeezed my hand, trying to convey some unspoken message as we walked back along the edge of the house. I didn’t know what Nolan wanted, but when we reached a freshly broken window in the guest bedroom, it became apparent. He waved the gun toward the frame, which was now fully engulfed in flames. “Get inside.”
“Are you fucking crazy?” Birdie snarled. “You’d have to shoot me before I climbed in there.”
Without warning, Nolan struck out and cracked the gun across Birdie’s face. I screamed in horror as she crumpled to the ground, scrambling to help her, but Nolan wasn’t having it.
“Get up,” he ordered. “And climb into the window.”
“Why are you doing this?” I yelled. “What the hell is wrong with you? Lucian trusted you!”
“I don’t have a choice.” The end of his gun met the skin on my forehead, cold and unforgiving. “Get back into the house.”
It occurred to me then that he didn’t want to shoot me because he wanted to make it look as though we’d died in the fire. That might have bought me some time, if I didn’t also know that he wasn’t past smashing our skulls in and tossing us in the window himself.
“Nolan, look, whatever’s going on, we can work it out,” I tried to bargain.
“No, we can’t,” he gritted out. “You were never supposed to be a part of this. If you hadn’t come along, everything would have been fine. He would have died like he wanted, and everything would have been fine. But you fucking ruined it.”
Birdie stirred on the ground, groaning, and I tried to kneel to help her, but Nolan wouldn’t allow it. “This is your last chance before I put a bullet in her head. I know you don’t want to see that.”
He wasn’t joking. Something was frantic and wild in his eyes, spurring him to do this. The man I’d only ever known to be calm natured was now lost in a sea of despair. “I’m going to count to three, and if you and your sister aren’t climbing into that window—”
A blur moved in behind him, tackling him to the ground and forcing the breath from his chest.
“Lucian!” My voice was too hoarse to yell anymore, but I had never been so happy to see anyone in my life.
He’d pinned Nolan to the ground, shoving his face into the dirt with one hand while he struggled for the gun with the other.
“My wife?” he roared. “My unborn son?”
“I had no choice,” Nolan grunted.
A shot rang out, and I screamed as both men froze. I didn’t know who fired it. I didn’t know who had been hit.
“Lucian?”
He didn’t respond, but it was Nolan who began to cough. “I was going to lose everything.”
“And now, you have.” Lucian raised the gun and held it against Nolan’s jaw. “Just tell me why.”
“The money,” Nolan sputtered. “I needed the money.” Tears streamed down his face as he shook his head. “I’m so sorry, Lucian. I’m sorry I let you down. Please find it in your heart to forgive me.”
Nolan wrapped his bloody hands around Lucian’s. I thought he was going to fight, but instead, in a move that surprised us all, he forced the trigger. Blood exploded across Lucian’s face, and when my eyes moved to the place where Nolan’s face had been, nothing was left but a gaping hole.
Sirens sounded in the distance, and I couldn’t catch my breath. Lucian scrambled away from Nolan and moved toward me slowly, haloed by the light of the fire, the avenging angel I had once declared him to be. Blood and soot smeared his clothes, and his hand was clearly burned, but he was alive. He wrapped his arms around me and whispered the three sweetest words I’d ever heard.
“I’m here, baby.”