While happy to see her friend, she was still upset for being shut out. Becca was never one to lie though. Before getting too mad, Audrey’s figured she should let her explain what was going on. Then she could decide if she wanted to stay angry at her friend.“Oh boy,” Becca sighed. “Okay. So you two know my dad is a building contractor. It’s not a big business, but he does all right.” They nodded. “Well, he had a pretty slow month and started having money issues. That’s when I first sort of disappeared. I went back home to help.”“Back in Darlington?” Audrey clarified.“Yeah.”“We were still in contact at that point,” Tracy added. “We lost touch not long after though. You went radio silent.”“Like, I said. Things got out of hand. The business finally went bankrupt. It was a good thing I had already graduated or else I would have had to drop out. But because of everything going on, I had to quit my own job. I was actually going to ask you guys for help. But then I found out what the rea
I’ll ask Lucien about it. It’s his company, right?”“That’s the problem,” she huffed. “After everything that happened, I went through all the paperwork and saw that it didn’t say ‘Reynolds Industries’ on it anywhere.”“How is that possible?” Audrey asked.“I asked Dad about it. He told me that the project manager explained that Reynolds Industries had handed the building over to one its subsidiaries. Dad had the good sense to question it at first, but after he saw those dollar signs, all good sense flew out the window.”“That’s suspicious,” Audrey said.“It gets worse. I contacted Reynolds Industries to confirm all of this. The subsidiary is a company called RS Holdings. It was under the Reynolds Industries umbrella but had been operating alone for years.”“Like they broke away?”“More like Reynolds Industries pushed them away. The woman I spoke to wouldn’t say much. But she told me that RS Holdings was a stand-alone company now.”“This is getting shadier and shadier by the second,” T
Lucien knew he didn’t imagine the way Audrey’s eyes glazed over when she looked at him. He knew that look. He’d seen it many times when his body hovered over hers.‘She’s really going to make me fight for this,’he realized. It was evident that she was struggling to keep her desires at bay.“Let me put on something more suitable for the public eye,” Lucien smirked.“Uh huh,” Audrey managed. “I’ll wait in the foyer.”“Sure.”Audrey rushed out. The tension in that room had been getting thicker and thicker.“Ugh,” she said to herself. “Why does he have to be so hot?”Before changing, Lucien decided he needed to make a quick phone call. If all the things going on were connected, he would need to ensure that he was around to keep Audrey safe. At least until things had been figured out.“Hello, Mr. Reynolds,” his assistant answered. “It’s great to hear from you. I’m glad you’re out.”“I’m glad to be out too,Tiffany. Listen, I need a favor.”“Yes, sir.”“Go ahead and submit for my paternity l
“Well,” he smirked to himself. “I won’t be going to work. No need to wear a suit every day.” It was a diabolical plan. But if he was ever going to be with Audrey again, he had to start somewhere. He stepped into the shower and enjoyed the feeling of the water cascading around him. It ran all over his body, and he couldn’t help but think it should be Audrey’s hands all over him instead. He imagined her in the shower with him, her nails dragging down his back as he pressed his body into hers.“I don’t know how much longer I can hold out. God, I want her so bad,” he groaned. “I’ve got to get a hold of myself.” He switched the water from hot to cold, to keep himself from getting to worked up.Something told him Audrey wouldn’t appreciate him greeting her with a full-blown erection. Or maybe she would… but let’s not take that chance.After calming down, he got dressed in another pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt.As he was only going across the hall to see Audrey and his baby, it seemed lik
“Come on, baby,” he said to Bella.”Let’s go to bed.”After Bella was tucked in and fast asleep,Lucien went over to settle himself on the couch. Audrey was still in the living room, stunned by what had just transpired.“Are you okay?”“Yeah,” she answered. “I guess when you said that… I try really hard not to think about…before.” She hung her head.“It’s all I ever think about.”“What?” Her head snapped up.“The second I walked away that day, all I wanted to do was rip that door down and tell you I wasn’t leaving.”“I…,” she was dazed by his confession. His honey eyes burned and looked like molten gold with the intensity of his stare. It held her in place, reminding her of the power those eyes alone could wield over her. “Sometimes I wish you had,” she whispered.Lucien crossed the room in a flash and stood in front of her. Electric currents seemed to pass between them. He walked towards her, but Audrey backed away. Her mind screamed at her. No! Tell him to go away! Or go to your room
Get off!” Lucien shoved him away. Damian’s words stung him a little. But there was no way he’d ever let that show. “I need you to stay with Bella while I go look for her. She trusts you.”“How do I know you aren’t lying? How do I know you haven’t hurt her and are just trying to cover your tracks? You better not have laid a hand on her.”“I haven’t touched her… in a way she didn’t like,” Lucien smirked. He couldn’t resist jabbing Damian with that. She is mine.“You fucking…”“We don’t have time for this! Every second you spend arguing with me is a second, she could be in danger. Stay with Bella. There are bottles in the fridge, and Minnie’s instructions on how to heat them are on the counter. I have to go.”Lucien grabbed his keys and phone and ran out. Adrenaline pumped throughout his body, setting every nerve in his body on fire. He started driving towards his uncle’s home. If he sped, he could make it there in about 45 minutes. The streets were quiet and empty, and Lucien’s car was a
“So, what’s the plan?”Damian.“You’ll hear it in a second. I have a phone call to make. Stay there. You’re in on this too.”Lucien called Mark, who answered on the first ring. He put the phone on speaker so Damian could hear.“Tracy filled you in?” Lucien asked.“As much as she could,” Mark answered.“She around?”“Right here.”“Put your phone on speaker. I only want to say this once.”“I’m here,” Tracy’s voice came over the phone.“Good. I have Damian here with me as well. So, things have changed. Audrey has been kidnapped.”“You said what?!”Tracy screamed.“I got a call after I spoke to you. Whoever it is used a voice changer. I’m pretty sure Eugene is behind this.”“Do you think he would hurt her?” Tracy was near tears.“I… don’t know. Eugene has done some shady things in the past. He’s manipulative and power hungry. He’ll do just about anything to get what he wants.”“So why take Audrey?” Damian asked.“I’m afraid that this may be about me. He wants the company, and he’ll do whate
“I…” Lucien didn’t know what to say. He wanted to argue that he could make her happy. But what happiness had he ever brought her? A few shared idyllic moments were all they had. Everything else was fighting. Always fighting.‘We’re only good at one thing,’he thought. And then it hit him. He was the problem,always the problem He left Audrey, broken and battered.Damian came in to pick up the pieces to make her whole again, and he came back to ruin everything. It was exactly what Mia had done to him. If Audrey chose to make a life with Damian, would he be able to let her go?“I don’t doubt that,” Lucien managed to say. “But until she says she doesn’t want me, I won’t leave.”“All you’ve done is bring chaos into her life. From the moment she met you. But… I can tell you love her too,” Damian sighed. “I’m willing to put my ill feelings towards you aside. Until we get her back. Then I’ll go back to hating you.”“That’s fair,” Lucien chuckled. “You know, had we met under different circumsta
NEARLY TEN YEARS LATER….Lucien came to a halt in front of a school,he sometimes come to get the kids from school,sometimes Audrey does that or their driver.He got down from his car and saw them approaching,all three of them.Louis ran up to him excitedly.Lucien caught him and carried him on his arms.“How was school today?”Lucien asked.“It was fine.”His eldest child,Bella replied with a broad smile.He gave Braylon,his second child who was seven years old a fist bump as they got into the car.***********Lucien hurried around the kitchen,Audrey was busy with work today so he had wanted to take care of the children,feed them and put them to sleep before she comes back home so that when she gets back,she can have a good rest…well a good rest after they finish making love.He was preparing pasta for the kids and he knew he had to make it perfect,otherwise,Braylon would complain and tease him for days.Audrey has been busy these past couple of days but she promised to make it up to him
“What does that even mean?”“He had a strange obsession with Lucien. Everything Lucien did, he wanted to do. Everything Lucien had, he wanted to have. There was one year that he intentionally matched everything Lucien wore. He used to tell everyone that they had the same middle name. He even started talking to another girl in our class named Mia just because that was Lucien’s girlfriend’s name. I never liked him.”“Lucien never noticed this?”Mark let out a long, heavy sigh.“What you need to understand about Lucien, especially at that age, is that he was hungry for validation. Starving for it. If anything, all that strange attention made him feel important. To be perfectly honest, there may even be a good chance he didn’t even notice it. He was so wrapped up in Mia… his world didn’t have capacity for anything else.”Audrey felt small for a moment.“He really loved her, didn’t he?”Mark glanced at her for a moment and noted the sadness in her eyes.“He thinks he did. That wasn’t love,
“We saw that sexy ass car out here, and Nathan got the keys to go move it,” another young officer explained with tears in eyes and panic in his voice. “We all wanted… we all wanted to see. But when he turned the key… when he turned the key…” the young man sobbed. “Some people were too close and got caught in the explosion.”Captain Whitlock looked over at Lucien.“I think you were already bait and didn’t even know.”It was as though he was moving through sand. Nothing registered. Nothing clicked. Not the unnatural metal of the handcuffs as they tightened around his wrists. Not the officers’ angry voices as the read him his rights, or the rough hands that pushed and shoved him into a cell. Not when those cell doors slid home with a loud, echoing clang. Captain Whitlock tried to stop the way they were mishandling him. But they had lost one of their own. A young man who was vibrant and full of life, at the beginning of his career.Another one. Because of me?“I get one phone call. I need
Lucien’s eyes flashed up at the captain, filled with anger and anguish.“She contacted me while I was in Italy,” he almost snarled.“After you and Audrey had just been married?” Captain Whitlock raised an eyebrow.“Don’t judge me. There were… circumstances about that marriage. Either way, I didn’t want to see her. But she said that she needed someone to keep her from… Hurting herself.”The irony. She had run to him once to prevent that. But in the end, she had forced him to witness it. His eyes were dark and stony as he fought to keep his emotions in check. Part of him wanted to give in. To breakdown and just give in to himself. Anything to make these feelings go away forever.Captain Whitlock softened as he realized what was going on in Lucien’s mind.“Sorry. Why was she seeking such an intense escape?”“She was running from him. She said their marriage was in shambles and that things had gone horribly wrong, that he was cheating on her.”“That was it? He wasn’t hurting her?”“She sa
“Philip Carson”The name hung in the air between them, like a two-ton brick. After all this time, Ghost had a name. Now the hunter, could become the hunted.“Holy shit,” the captain fell back into his chair. All the air left his lungs. “That punk? That punk is Ghost?”“You know him?” Lucien’s eyes almost fell from his head.“I had him. Right here in this office years ago,” Captain Whitlock seethed. “Right there!” he shouted and kicked his chair across the room. “Ghost was right there!”“What the hell for?”“That piece of shit kid was always getting into trouble. Vandalism, petty theft, property theft, arson… all kinds of stuff. Typical spoiled rich boy shit. No offense. I always knew that kid was disturbed. He had no remorse for anything. The only thing he ever regretted was getting caught”“This was before he became Ghost obviously.”“Well, yes. But do you know that this means?”“What?”“It’s insanity. It’s the most oversimplification of anything that has ever happened.”“What?” Luci
He began spending most of his time at the building. “Command” they’d been calling it. Eugene and Mia couldn’t be trusted. The first prisoner,Racheal…Rebecca … whatever her name was, was being beaten even though he had given explicit instructions that she was not to be touched. And Mia could not at all be trusted with the other one. God, what was that one’s name? Ava? Avery? It was something with an “A”he was certain. Either way, it didn’t matter. They had to keep them both alive and the two overly emotional idiots he was working with were going to mess it up.Lucien was supposed to do a press conference and announce that he was relinquishing the company over to his cousin. The press conference was Eugene’s idea. He wanted a public take down and humiliation of his cousin. He was all for anything that made Lucien suffer. This plan wasn’t going to work. But he was interested to see how it would unfold.They planned to watch the press conference together. After it, his plan was to slink
His life had become a tunnel and the only light at the end of it was the demise of Lucien. It was the driving force in his soul. It was the pulsing his blood. His first meeting with Eugene set his plan back into motion. There was no improvising. Without even realizing, Lucien had been slipping through his fingers like fine sand. Always just beyond his reach. But this time he would get inside of Lucien’s world and destroy him from within.He kept a close watch on Lucien’s personal life. It seemed Mia had run back to marry him as he had anticipated. What he didn’t anticipate was the wrath it fueled in him. It was interesting. It had been so long since he felt any real emotion that it caught him off guard. Ever since he’d killed his father, it was as though he’d murdered his own feelings as well. Other than hate, nothing else lived within him. He often wondered why he even continued to do anything. He did have to admit that he was chasing the thrill of that first kill. Nothing ever seeme
“I told you not to get involved with her. Her father is my rival, and he has been encroaching on our territory. This,” he indicated the dead woman. “is a message.”“I loved her!” he screamed back, cradling her corpse in his arms.“You loved the other one too.”“This was different,” he cried. “She was pregnant! You killed my woman and my baby! We were going to tell you tomorrow night at dinner!”“Then I did you a favor. Children are a weakness, and you aren’t strong enough yet.”“Not strong enough?” he saw red. The vestiges of whatever humanity he had left dissipated. All that was left behind was anger and a thirst for vengeance. All the warmth left his soul. There was nothing left now. Nothing except an abyss with no end. He leveled his own gun at his father. “No one is stronger than me.”“Son, be careful.” His father’s eyes went wide. He dropped his gun and threw up his hands. He walked backwards slowly, like an animal being cornered by a predator. “You’re overly emotional right now.
Once she made the mistake of asking him what he and his father did. He brandished a gun and held it to her chest. To her immense relief, it wasn’t loaded. But she found that out only after he fired it. Bone aching terror was all she knew. Whatever life she had was almost gone. The only thing that was left was the memory of Lucien.Being with him was the last time she felt happy and safe. She clung onto the memories, and they were the only things keeping her afloat. Life was a nightmare and she just wanted to sleep.He knew he should have been treating her better. He knew that, but he just couldn’t seem to care. They were in love once. Or perhaps they just thought they were. The truth was that he was an escape to her. An escape from a life she thought she didn’t want. It was obvious that she wanted out. But his one issue was who she wanted to run to. He’d let her go if he knew that she wasn’t going back to him, back to Lucien.He refused to lose to him. So, as long as he knew she would r