Chapter 5: A Man Who Doesn't Read

The doorbell had rung, a subtle tinkle usually overlooked in the soft hum of **Chapter & Soul**. But today, it had been as if a storm had blown into the shop.

Lena stopped shelving a collection of classics and stood still.

He handed back in.

Julian Blackwood.

Today, he didn't send his driver. Didn't ride in the car. He came into her serene world of poetry and fantasy like a living oxymoron—charcoal cut coat, dark gray trousers, shiny shoes that didn't so much click as *announce* with every step. His presence didn't belong here, not quite. He was all clean lines and brutal beauty in a room of soft curves and weathered wooden shelves.

His eyes scanned the bookstore with subdued calculation, not with wonder but with purpose, as if he were inspecting a house for sale. And yet. there was something in his stance—his stillness—that hinted at doubt. Maybe even hesitation.

"Hi," Lena said quietly, brushing a lock of hair from behind her ear, trying to stifle the unexpected hitch in her breath. "Aria's in the back, painting dragons.".

“I know,” he said. His voice was deep, smooth, and controlled. “I’m early.”

It wasn’t an apology.

He looked around like he’d stepped into a foreign country. His hand brushed a nearby shelf absently, eyes pausing on a spine titled *The Art of Stillness*. He didn’t pull it down.

“You’re not exactly a regular,” Lena offered gently, half a smile on her lips.

“I don’t read.”

She cocked her head, eyebrows furrowed. "You… don't read?"

"Not for pleasure," he clarified, gaze narrowing on her with an expression that was half question, half guard. "Only what is necessary. Reports. Contracts. Things that matter."

Lena folded her arms, a mischievous glint in her eyes. "That's a little sad."

His brow went up, a fraction. "Sad?"

"Books are not merely escape," she clarified. "They're mirrors. You learn aspects of yourself you didn't even realize you were missing.".

Julian’s lips twitched in what could’ve been a smirk—or maybe it was just a reflex. “I’m not missing anything.”

“I doubt that,” Lena replied without missing a beat.

He blinked. The audacity of it should have irritated him. Most people didn’t talk to him like that. They softened themselves. Watched their words. But she… didn’t flinch.

Lena walked over to a little table display and picked up a thin, cloth-bound book. She walked over to him, holding it out like an offering.

*The Quiet Between Lightning Strikes.*

A poetry book. The cover was old and nubbly, the title scribbled in fine silver ink.

Julian stared at it like it was an alien thing.

"What's this?"

"A book," she said, smiling.

"I told you. I don't—"

"Read, I know." She stepped closer, but just a little, closing the distance between them but not entirely. Her voice dropped a little. "Just… humor me. It's short. You can read it in an hour. Maybe you'll hate it. Maybe you'll like something in it that makes you. feel."

He gazed at her, grinding his jaw. Instinct was howling to refuse. To exit. To regain control. But her eyes caught him. Not begging. Simply *giving*.

He wasn't used to being given something on demand.

Julian removed the book from between her fingers.

Their skin was touching for an instant—flesh to flesh.

A shock. Not electricity, exactly. Something more muted, deeper. A moment of tension so fine it would have broken if either of them breathed too deeply.

"Fine," he growled, low, even.

"Just this once,"

Lena smiled at him then. Actually. Softly. Brightly. Completely unguarded.

And that, more than anything else, unsettled him.

Because he could feel it.

In his chest.

That deadly spark again.

He scanned the cover, thumb following the title, then back at her. "Why this one?"

"It's a book about sadness," she told him quietly. "But not the kind that cries out. The kind that settles into the space between us."

Some dark, wordless flicker showed behind his eyes.

He nodded once, palming the book into his coat pocket as if it was evidence in a case he wasn't ready to break yet.

Aria’s laugh echoed from the back, and he turned toward it. That was why he came, after all. Not for the book. Not for the woman with ink-stained fingers and stars in her eyes.

Or so he told himself.

“I’ll wait for her out front,” he said.

Lena nodded. “Take your time.”

He turned to go, but paused at the door. Glanced back.

“You always hand books out to strange men in suits?”

"Only the ones who appear to have forgotten how to feel," she said, soft but unafraid.

His lips curled slightly open. He didn't answer.

Didn't have to.

He turned away, the bell clinking after him, the book still heavy in his coat pocket.

Lena remained there and watched him disappear into the fogged evening and exhaled, not realizing she had been holding her breath.

A man who does not read," she whispered to herself, her head moving in denial as she swung back around to the counter.

Maybe, though, just maybe… he would start.