The trip from the hospital started was thick with silence. Lucien wanted to pretend he was okay with her going back there, but inside he was fuming. As far as he saw it, there was no reason for her to go back. She belonged back in the city with him. If she didn’t want to live with him, fine. He could get an apartment for her and Bella to live in. But to be honest, he didn’t like that either. And there wasn’t any reason for her to continue to work for Damian. Or anywhere. He could provide and take care of her. All of their needs would be met, and Bella would never want for anything. He made more than enough money to ensure that Audrey every desire was catered to. When Bella grew up, she would have the finest of everything.But she refused him.Audrey wanted to continue to live her life away from him and then in the same breath tell him she wanted to be with him. It didn’t make any sense at all. Why couldn’t she understand what he was trying to do?“Our lives can’t be just about each ot
You’re not serious,” Mark laughed. “You’re mad because she won’t drop her life and run to only exist as who you need her to? She can only have a life if you want her to have one? Don’t you hear how insane that sounds?”“That’s not what I meant.”“Yes, it is. Let me guess. You want her to quit her job, uproot her father from his facility, that he loves and is thriving at, move out of her apartment, lose all sense of her own identity, so she can move in with you and do nothing?”“Why do you make it sound so bad?”Lucien retorted.“Because it is! It’s terrible! That’s not how relationships work!”“Then what am I supposed to do? I don’t know how this works. Do I just see her sometimes and let her just… do whatever?“Yes! You make plans, and then they get cancelled because she doesn’t have a babysitter. You see each other on weekends. Whatever the arrangement you had before is dead. And you aren’t married. You don’t own her. You never will. She’s your girlfriend now, and you’re going to tre
Oh my God,” Audrey whispered as a furious blush spread across her face.Bella finished her bottle. Audrey placed her in her little bouncy chair, and Bella happily batted at the arch of toys over her head. Audrey prepared breakfast for herself and Lucien. They really needed to sit down and hash out how they were going to work things out. She wasn’t going to quit her job. And he would have to ease up on whatever restrictions or precautions she knew he was plotting. There was every certainty that he was assembling some sort of crazy security team to escort her everywhere. And she’d be damned if she allowed that.They would really have to set the ground rules.***********Lucien was feeling the best he’d felt in a long time. He whistled as he went through his clothes picking something simple to wear. While he knew he wouldn’t be able to stay there long, he was determined to enjoy what time they did have. Memories of last night played on a loop in his mind, and he was already looking forwa
Audrey was glad for the company. Being alone wasn’t something she was looking forward to.Sure. Use your key, Audrey messaged back. After a few minutes, the lock clicked, and Damian let himself in.“Hi,” he greeted, helping himself to a cup of coffee. He moved comfortably through the apartment. It had become a second home to him for a while. Audrey sat at the table, and Damian sat across from her.“Hi. What brings you around?”Damian smiled while looking into his cup.“Things really are different. Not that long ago, you never would have ask me that.”“Oh,” Audrey flushed with realization. “I’m sorry.”“Don’t be sorry. You and Lucien are together officially. And I can tell just by looking at you that you’re happy. It’s all I ever wanted for you.”“Damian—”“Please let me say this,” he put his hand up to stop her. “It’s true that I did once have feelings for you. But I always knew that you and I would never be together. I knew you still loved Lucien, and so you could never love me. I ca
For the first time, Lucien mourned. Not because he missed her. He wouldn’t. He mourned her for who she used to be. For what she once meant to him. He mourned her because of what she had devolved to. What happened for her to spiral this way? There had to be more than what she said to him. He mourned her, she who was his first love. All she wanted was not to be forgotten. All he wanted was to forget.He opened the photo album. The first photo was from Lucien’s nineteenth birthday party. Gary had rented a smaller boutique hotel with a pool. The photo captured a silly moment between them.Mia was perched on Lucien’s shoulders while he flexed his muscles showing off how strong he was. Signs of a lively party were caught behind them. People dancing and splashing in the pool. Even Mark was in the photo.In the background, unnoticed with his back to the camera, was someone Lucien didn’t know. He wore a white t-shirt. A tattoo of a claw was visible on his neck.*************“I haven’t been on
“Hi,” she breathed.“Hi. You look great,” he eyed her up and down.“So do you,” she said accepting the flowers. “These are gorgeous. Let me put these in water and we can go.”After getting the flowers situated, Damian held out on arm for her.“Shall we?”**********Lucien dismissed his eighth and last meeting of the day. His brain felt like it was going to fall out of his ears before he made it home. In the short time Eugene had taken over, Reynolds Industries was in free fall. It reminded him of the catastrophe he dealt with right after he and Audrey had been married and he had to run off to Italy. The employees were terrified especially after the police had begun the formal investigation.So many people had been let go or arrested in connection with the corruption. The remainder were scared. Lucien set up meetings with every department so hear their grievances and begin to heal the wounded company.Reynolds Industries was bleeding, and he had to stop it.It had gone that way all wee
No matter what happens in your life, you need to remember that you didn’t know happiness until you knew me.“That doesn’t make anything you did okay,” he said through clenched teeth to the ghost that plagued his peace. His phone rang, startling him. It was Audrey.“Hey baby,” he greeted.“Mmm,” she purred. “I love when you call me that.”Her voice was like a balm on his frayed nerves. A soothing, cool breeze whispering on a hot day.“You can’t talk to me like that when I’m at work,” he smiled. “I could get in trouble.”“In trouble? Aren’t you the big bad CEO?” she teased.“You need to stop before this big bad CEO goes over there and shows you just how big and bad he can be.”“Maybe that’s exactly what I want.”Lucien’s pants suddenly felt tight, and all his previous thoughts were forgotten.“Get ready,” he warned.“I’m always ready,” Audrey shot back.Every time you kiss her... That feeling. I taught you that.“Good,” Lucien answered, with a touch less fervor than before.“Okay, there
“I don’t know when it ends, but I’m doing what I can.”“I know,” Lucien deflated. “I’m sorry about all this,” he said indicating the mess he’d made.“Don’t worry about it. It’s not the first time someone has thrown things off my desk. I learned to get things that can’t break. But about this video, I need you to watch it. I need to know what you make of it.”They watched the video, the captain pausing it at different parts to point things out. The mystery man was bone chilling. The way he spoke, the way he moved set Lucien’s teeth on edge.“What do you think?” the captain asked.“This guy… do you know who he is?”“No. I was hoping you did.”“No, I don’t know him. But I can’t shake the feeling that I’ve seen him somewhere before.”“He seems to at least know of you.”“Everyone knows of me,” Lucien said. “Everyone knows who I am. That doesn’t help. There’s something about him. It makes me feel… watched.”“Right now, this is the prime suspect in your cousin’s murder. And we have no idea wh
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