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Riley pulled Blaire into her arms.

“I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry,” Blaire whispered over and over.

“Stop,” Aiden growled out. “It’s not your fault. It’s the fault of that creepy ass stepbrother who thought you’d be married to him.”

Lukas sat up abruptly, dropping Blaire’s hand. “There’s no way in hell I’ll ever allow that to happen!” He gritted his teeth as he snarled out, “I will fucking kill him before I let that happen. I won’t stop next time. I really will turn him into red mist.”

Aiden said, “It’s not going to be a problem anymore. The school is taking care of it. He likely won’t even remember Blaire, or at least his obsession with her, by the time they finish with him,”

Blaire trembled in Riley’s arms, hugging herself and leaning away from the reminder of the feral version of Lukas.

“Fuck, Blaire.” Aiden looked over at her. “I can see you shaking from here. What’s wrong?”

“She’s scared,” Lukas said through his clenched teeth.

Seth furrowed his brow. “How do you know?”

“I can fucking feel it!” Lukas shouted again and Blaire jumped, clinging onto Riley.

“Shit. Man, she’s afraid of you,” Aiden said, standing up.

Lukas jerked his head to look at Blaire, his eyes going wide. “What? No. Why would she be afraid of me?” He paused and reached out toward Blaire, his voice softening, confusion, and anxiety laced his tone. “Blaire?”

Blaire flinched and pulled tightly into Riley’s embrace to get away from him, not able to get control of her shaking. She didn’t want to be afraid of Lukas, but she still saw his descended fangs, his glowing eyes, Caleb’s bloody and broken body under his hands, his monster looming large and threatening in that alley—

“No…” Lukas ran his hands through his hair, squeezing the strands at the back of his neck. “Fuck! I would never hurt you! Fuck! Don’t you get how I feel about you?”

Blaire knew intellectually he wouldn’t hurt her, but something was wrong with her. The events of tonight. Everything that had happened since she arrived. It all came crashing down around her. All she could do was cry; she couldn’t even tell Lukas she was sorry for being afraid.

“You need to go wash the blood from your hands and calm down. You are of no use to Blaire in the state you are in right now,” Kai said calmly, but with an authoritative edge to his voice.

Lukas jumped up from the bed and stalked to the bathroom, slamming the door.

Kai stood. “Perhaps a movie would do good to ease everyone’s tension.” He pulled a random movie from his collection and put it in the player, turning the lights out before returning to the bed and settling in with Mera. Aiden sat back down in the chair, rubbing his face. Seth joined him, sitting on the floor next to his feet.

After fifteen minutes, Lukas came out of the bathroom much more docile. He moved to sit on the floor in front of the bed where Blaire now lay on her side, softly crying in Riley’s lap as everyone watched the movie in silence.

Once the movie ended, Kai turned the light on, and everyone got up to leave. Riley started to wake Blaire, who had fallen asleep curled up in her lap, but Lukas held out a hand.

“Don’t. I’ll carry her home. She’s been through enough and just needs to rest.”

“Are you sure you’re okay to do that?” Riley questioned, squinting at him as she eyed him warily.

Lukas sighed. “I’m good now.” He pulled on his leather jacket.

Riley nodded and sat back to allow Lukas to lift Blaire into his arms.

“It’s best we don’t mention this to anyone unless the police come calling,” Aiden said as he looked around at everyone, and they nodded in agreement.

The walk back to the dorm was torture. In the silence, Lukas faced the fact that the person who had become the most important thing in his world was now afraid of him. He had to fix this. Blaire had suffered so much, and all he wanted to do was protect her from everything.

Tonight, he wanted to kill someone for the first time in his life, really kill them. Sure, he’d wanted whoever had taken Blaire’s blood dead, but he hadn’t felt this murderous tension. The need to destroy. If it erased Blaire’s trauma, he would do it without hesitation. Had he not played around with Caleb, taking pleasure in making the monster suffer for everything he’d put Blaire through, and instead ended his pathetic existence swiftly, he wouldn’t have regretted it for a second. But if he had done that, he’d have been taken away to Cresbel Asylum, and he’d never see Blaire again. It was a twisted silver lining to the storm cloud of their night out.

Once he entered the dorm room and kicked the door closed with his foot lightly, he walked Blaire over to her bed, laying her down on her stomach. He unlaced the corset of her dress, before turning her over, and slipping the garment from her body. She wore only a pair of black lace panties underneath, but desire for her body submerged beneath his worry. Too upset with what happened, he just wanted to take care of her.

Lukas lifted her into his arms as she fell limply against him and slipped one of his t-shirts over her head. He rested her back against her pillow, lifting her arms to work them through the sleeves, before pulling the shirt down to cover her body. He pulled the covers up over her, then kissed her forehead, before getting up and turning off the bedside lamp.

Tomorrow he had to do damage control.