The idea of Graham having Lucy...
standing beside her, taking care of her, being the one she turns to...
Something in me snaps.
“No,” I say.
It comes out rough. Certain. Absolute.
I look at them all now.
“I don’t care who else was on that dance floor. I don’t care who my father dragged over here. I don’t care how badly I played it.”
My hands curl into fists.
“But she is not interchangeable.”
Silence ripples around the table.
“I couldn’t tell you the name of a single woman I touched tonight,” I continue. “But I can tell you exactly how Lucy looked when she walked into this room. I can tell you how her breathchanged when I was too close. I can tell you how it felt when she stood beside me.”
Theo stares at me like he’s seeing something new.
“Something’s changed,” I say quietly. “And she’s at the center of it.”
Caleb steps closer. “What are you going to do?”
I don’t have an answer.
Not yet.
“How are you going to make this right?” Theo asks. “Because if I were Whitaker, I’d be glued to her side right now.”
That thought hits harder than anything else tonight.
Lucy.
In a hospital.
Scared.
With Graham.
I turn, restless, mind racing for leverage, for strategy, for anything...
And then I see him.
Exactlywho I need.
And for the first time all night, I stop thinking how my father taught me.
I start thinking like a man who is about to fight for something he should never have risked losing.
Chapter 22 - Lucy
The city looks different from the back seat of Graham Whitaker’s car.
Less sharp. Less cruel. Like it’s holding its breath instead of trying to swallow me whole.
