34. NIKOLAI #2
“There’s this winding stretch of road that cuts through the ridge. Locals call it the Devil’s Spine because it’s really curvy and has a steep drop on one side. A drunk driver crossed the center line and hit them head on.”
I kept my body still, my face unreadable, even as her words punched through me.
“They went over the edge. The car fell into the ravine and exploded.” Her breath hitched. “The police told me…the impact killed them before the flames could. That they didn’t feel it.”
“Jesus,” I murmured.
“I’d just turned eighteen.” She looked up, her eyes haunted. “I was just old enough to be the one who had to go identify the bodies. Just old enough to be the one to sign papers, pay bills, and make decisions I wasn’t ready for.”
My jaw clenched.
“I didn’t have time to fall apart. There was an estate to settle, debts to pay off. I didn’t have much left afterward. I scraped together what I could, stashed it, and told myself I’d be okay. That I’d figure it out.”
“You did more than that,” I said, my voice low. “You survived and didn’t give up on life or your dreams.”
She gave me a sad, crooked smile. “Yeah. I’m scrappy .”
Her pain wrapped around me like barbed wire. But it was that fierce, steel-spined independence she wore like armor that fucking gutted me.
I couldn’t sit on the other side of the sectional anymore, couldn’t allow this distance between us. So, I stood and crossed over to her.
Her brows lifted in a silent question, but she didn’t move when I bent and slipped one arm under her knees and the other around her back. I scooped her up gently and sat down with her in my lap.
She relaxed into me, and we sat in silence for a few heartbeats before she continued.
“I waited a couple of years. Saved. Planned. Then I came here—to Manhattan.”
She quietly rested a hand on my chest.
“Technically, you don’t deserve my whole story,” she said in that signature sarcasm that indicated she was becoming uncomfortable. “But I’ll give it to you anyway, because I’ve got nothing to hide. I’m not the one who holes up in a hacker cave full of secrets,” she added teasingly.
“Fair enough,” I said, pulling her closer against me and rubbing her back. “I’ll take whatever you’re willing to share.”
She inhaled deeply. “All that to say, the reason I took Lyla’s name…it wasn’t just because I’m twenty and can’t legally work in half the places that actually pay rent money. It was because—”
She faltered, her hand sliding down my chest to the hem of my T-shirt. There, she twisted her fingers into the fabric. “It was because I wanted to see her name in lights.”
I went still.
“I thought…if I could make it, if I could get even close to Broadway…maybe it would be like giving her the future she didn’t get to have.”
I didn’t know how to respond to that.
That wasn’t the answer I’d expected. I’d assumed she had practical reasons, like needing to be twenty-one to work in a club. Or maybe even that she had a touch of rebellion.
But this?
This was love, grief, and raw, aching devotion all rolled up into one.
She looked up at me. “You already knew about my age. About the fake ID, didn’t you?”
I nodded.
“And?”
“And I’m glad you weren’t using it for some darker purpose.” I held her chin, not letting her look away. “You’re not running from anything. You’re honoring someone, and I think that’s fair.”
She blinked fast, fighting the tears welling in her eyes. “You don’t think it’s stupid?”
I shook my head slowly. “I think it’s the bravest fucking thing I’ve heard in a long time—to give your success, your hard work, to another person because you love them.”
Her breath stuttered as though my words had knocked something loose inside her.
I ran a palm up her back, resting it between her shoulder blades. “Lacey.”
Her eyes lifted to mine.
“I like your real name. I think it suits you.”
A flush rose on her cheeks.
“Pretty things come bound in lace,” I murmured near her ear. “It’s delicate. But strong.”
She gave a small, disbelieving scoff.
I leaned in and nuzzled her neck. “And you? You’re one beautiful package.”
She didn’t say a word, just sniffled as silent tears fell.
For a long while, she lay there—curled in my lap, her head tucked under my jaw—breathing slow and steady like she hadn’t just bared her entire soul. Like she hadn’t just handed me the softest, purest part of herself and let me hold it without flinching.
I kept my arm snug around her waist while I traced slow, careful circles between her shoulder blades. My fingers moved, trying to soothe the pain I hadn’t earned the right to touch. And still—she let me. She trusted me. Trusted me .
Fuck.
The silence felt sacred, and for once, I didn’t want to fill it.
I just wanted to hold her.
I tilted my head slightly and let my lips rest against her temple. She smelled faintly of lavender and soap. Fresh. Innocent. Uncomplicated.
Lacey Grace Oakley.
Goddamn sunshine in human form.
Born of mountain wind and starlit skies. Raised in the open, where neighbors looked out for each other, and honesty wasn’t a tactic but a way of life.
And she’d made it through hell with all of that still intact.
No sharp edges. No fake smile. No schemes.
She wasn’t trying to manipulate me or get anything out of this moment.
She wasn’t asking for protection or power.
She was just…here.
In my world, women learned early how to lie with their eyes. How to dress up ambition and survival in lingerie and lust. They became shape-shifters and illusionists. They showed just enough softness to bait the trap.
But not Lacey.
She didn’t come wrapped in secrets or strategy.
She came wrapped in light.
And I was the darkness.
She was everything that shouldn’t survive in my world—and yet, here she was. Fragile but unbroken. Grieving but unashamed.
Lamb to my wolf.
Sunshine to my shadows.
Color to my gray.
And that was the fucking problem.
Because every instinct in me screamed to lock her away. To guard her. To own her.
I couldn’t stop looking at her. Couldn’t stop memorizing her face. It wasn’t the polished lipstick-slicked version of her I was attracted to, but this one. The girl who was barefaced, tear-streaked, and soft.
Untouched in all the ways that mattered.
I should’ve let her go the second I saw that. Should’ve cut her loose the way I’d done with every other fragile thing that came near me.
But I hadn’t. And I wouldn’t.
Because somewhere in the middle of her story—while she had been twisting her fingers in my shirt and whispering about honoring her sister’s memory by living her future for her—I’d felt something give inside me. Something deep. Something I hadn’t ever let surface.
And that was when I’d known.
It was when she was telling that quiet, tragic story that the truth of her— the true essence of Lacey —had been revealed to me with a primal force.
She was Persephone.
Pure spring caught in the harsh reality of my dark domain.
And I?
I was Hades.
King of an underworld forged not of myth but of concrete and blood.
I knew, in the gut-wrenching way only a man like me could, that what I was about to do was wrong. I knew every fiber of her being would scream against the chains I hadn’t even yet forged—but I couldn’t stop the inevitable.
I would make her mine.
My craving consumed me—an overwhelming longing that defied logic, morality, and every rule I lived by. Everything about it screamed violation . But as I watched her, seeing the fragile strength beneath the pain, the absolute virginity of her soul laid bare…
A hunger I had never even known existed devoured me.
I couldn’t stop.
I wouldn’t.
Because now that I knew who Lacey Grace Oakley really was?
There wasn’t a force on this goddamn planet that would stop me from protecting her.
Her cheek shifted against my chest, and her fingers grazed the chain around my neck where my henley had slipped open at the collar. She gently pulled the pendant out and studied it.
“Why a wolf?” she asked as it glinted in the firelight.
I looked down at the small white-gold wolf frozen mid-howl. “I’ve had it since I was a kid. It’s a part of a pair.”
She glanced up at me, curiosity sparking in her eyes. “Where’s the other one?”
“Somewhere safe,” I said softly. I wasn’t ready to tell her about Anastasia. Not yet.
Her thumb brushed over the wolf’s muzzle. “It suits you.”
I huffed a dark, quiet laugh. “Maybe. Or maybe it’s just a reminder of what I am.” My gaze held hers. “Wolves are predators; they guard their own fiercely.”
She smiled and tucked it back into my shirt.
After that, she stayed curled on my lap for a long time. Her breathing was soft and slow, like the storm inside her had finally burned itself out—for now.
I didn’t move—just sat there, holding her.
With one hand, I rubbed her back in slow, steady strokes. The other hand stayed tangled in her hair, keeping her close, as though if I let go for even a second, the world might take her again.
Minutes passed. Maybe more. I didn’t fucking care.
Eventually, her fingers loosened from the fabric of my shirt. Her body went slack with sleep.
I stayed a little longer until I was sure she was out.
Then, carefully, I slid one arm under her knees, wrapping the other behind her shoulders, and lifted her into my arms.
She didn’t stir.
Her face was soft. Innocent.
I carried her to the guest suite and nudged the door open with my foot, crossing the room and easing her down onto the bed.
She nestled into the pillow automatically.
I pulled the blanket up to her shoulders, tucking it in gently at her sides, then stood there for a moment, just watching her.
She didn’t look like someone who’d survived hell.
But she had.
Lacey’s life had been upended twice—once by fire and twisted metal, and again by bullets and greed—and somehow, she was still standing. Still fighting. Still soft in a world that demanded she harden.
She was stronger than she even knew.
She just needed time.
Time to heal. To grieve. To process the truth of what she’d been dragged into and what that meant for the rest of her life.
I would give her that time. However long it took.
Because even if she didn’t know it yet…
She was mine now.
And I wasn’t letting go.