My fingers tightened in Lucien’s jacket. I could feel the tension in him now, not anger, not jealousy. Calculation.
“You do not speak her name again,” Lucien said, his voice low and deadly quiet.
The man only smiled faintly. “You’ve kept her sheltered. That’s admirable but you cannot protect her fromherown blood.”
My heart began to pound so hard I could hear it in my ears.
“Lucien,” I whispered, not looking at him. “Who is he?”
Lucien didn’t answer. That said enough.
The stranger stepped forward into the light. His face was refined, composed, the kind of man who had never needed to raise his voice to be obeyed.
“She deserves to know,” he continued smoothly. “About her mother. About what she really was. About what you are.”
The air left my lungs. Lucien’s arm moved, sliding fully in front of me now. Protective. Absolute.
“You are trespassing,” Lucien said. “You have five seconds.”
The man’s eyes flicked to me again. There was no malice there. Only certainty.
“I will return, Seraphina,” he said softly. “And next time, I will not leave without truth being told.”
Before I could react, before I could even step forward, he turned and disappeared into the shadows beyond the terrace doors as if he had never been there at all. Silence swallowed us.
I slowly stepped around Lucien, staring at the empty entrance.
“You knew him,” I said quietly.
Lucien didn’t deny it and realization hurt more than I expected.
“You knew,” I repeated, my voice breaking.
He turned to face me fully now, hands coming to rest on my shoulders. Not forceful. Not rough. Steady.
“There are things I was waiting to tell you,” he said.
“Waiting?” I whispered. “Or hiding?”
Something flickered in his eyes, frustration, perhaps or fear.
“I was protecting you.”
I stepped back, “From what?”
He didn’t answer immediately and for the first time in months, the ground beneath me didn’t feel solid anymore.
CHAPTER 41
Lucien
By morning, the estate was no longer calm. Security had been doubled. Surveillance feeds were running through every monitor in the control room. Ronan hadn’t slept. Neither had I.
She wasn’t safe and that changed everything.
I found her in the training wing barefoot, arms folded tightly across her chest, staring out the tall arched window like she hadn’t moved all night.
When she heard my footsteps, she didn’t turn.
