Chapter 31 Lucian
LUCIAN
Nadia walks beside me - small, self-contained, wrapped in her own quiet gravity.
Time’s touched her, but it hasn’t bent her.
Her spine is still straight, her strength the kind that doesn’t need to be loud to be undeniable.
Even after Michael had his unwanted hands on her, even as fear still lingers on her skin.
Every few steps, her shoulder brushes mine, light but sparking like a match.
She doesn’t move away, and neither do I.
It’s insane, what we’re doing. She knows it. I know it. But neither of us cares enough to stop.
She tilts her head toward me, voice quiet but steady. “You know this is crazy, right? Walking the streets with a total stranger. I don’t even know your name.”
The corner of my mouth pulls. “Crazy, maybe. But you’re still doing it.”
Her lips twitch into something sharp. “Which probably makes me more foolish than brave.”
“Or maybe both,” I say, my tone low, even.
Her eyes cut to me, assessing, curious in that quiet, dangerous way. Then, with a tilt of her head and a voice too casual to be innocent, she says, “You could be a serial killer.”
I don’t soften the blow. I don’t hand her some plastic reassurance she won’t believe anyway. Instead, I let the words curl around us like a soft blanket.
“I could indeed.”
The silence after is a living thing. Her breath hitches, but I still hear it. Feel it. Her pulse thrums in the fragile column of her throat, visible in the streetlight. And still… she doesn’t veer away.
“Would you still walk with me if I were?” I ask, voice pitched low, intimate, for her ears only.
Her exhale shivers, but her steps don’t falter. “Apparently.”
Goddamn. This woman.
I stop myself from staring too long, drag my gaze back to the street. “Jude,” I tell her finally, because the truth—Lucian Cross—is a name she probably doesn’t want to hear. It doesn’t belong here. Lucian Cross died in a fire at Ford Pen while he was awaiting death by time. “Jude Mercer.”
She repeats it, barely above a whisper, rolling the name on her tongue. Jude. It sounds holy and unholy all at once when it falls from her lips.
We keep walking, and the city fades around us.
Her perfume is faint but sharp, mixing with the night air - citrus and jasmine, a heady combination that’s supposed to remind me of sunshine and meadows, but instead reminds me of darkness.
It tangles with me, sticks in my lungs. Every brush of her arm against mine ratchets my restraint tighter, until I feel it like barbed wire in my chest.
She doesn’t fill the silence with nervous chatter. She lets it breathe, lets it stretch taut between us until it hums with something alive.
When we reach her building, I stop dead, eyes sweeping over the place. Old stone, cracked steps, a lock that wouldn’t stop a kid with a paperclip. The hallway beyond is dark, shadows where shadows don’t belong. My gut clenches.
“Are you safe here?” I ask. It comes out rougher than I want, like gravel in my throat.
She shifts, uncomfortable under my scrutiny. “Safe enough.”
I arch a brow. “Doesn’t look like it.”
Her laugh is soft, defensive. “What looks safe ever is?”
She’s not wrong.
I stay quiet too long, and it makes her fidget, running her hand over the strap of her bag. I let the silence grind down a moment more before I say, “Anything else I can do for you? Want me to check under your bed for lurking monsters? The serial killer in me has to ask.”
Not far off from the truth, sweetheart.
That gets her. She laughs, startled and bright, head tipping back, and it punches through my chest in a way I wasn’t ready for. My mouth even quirks before I can kill the reaction.
“No, thank you,” she says, shaking her head, still smiling. “I think I can manage the monsters on my own.”
If only you knew, little dove.
She thanks me again, her voice softer this time. Then she climbs the steps, pausing just long enough to glance back at me before vanishing into the dim stairwell.
The door closes behind her with a hollow click, and I stand there like an idiot on the sidewalk, staring at peeling paint and a busted lock that could be kicked in with half a thought.
Safe here? Not a fucking chance.
My fingers itch to follow, to climb those stairs and sweep the shadows from her apartment, to plant myself in that too-small space and make sure nothing gets close enough to touch her. But I don’t.
Instead I jam my hands into my jacket pockets and force my feet to move.
The night stretches around me, loud, chaotic, but my head is full of her.
Her laugh - the startled, bright thing that slipped out when I mentioned monsters.
The way her lips shaped my false name like she was branding me with it.
The heat of her shoulder brushing mine in the dark.
She should be terrified of me. She was right - I could be a killer. Hell, I am one. She doesn’t even know how close to the truth she cut. But instead of fear, she gave me something else. Trust. Or maybe recklessness. Either way, it sticks to my skin like wet paint, impossible to scrub off.
I light a cigarette, but the taste is flat. Even the smoke can’t drown her out. I’m supposed to be a ghost, unseen, untouchable. And yet… tonight I lingered. Tonight I let her see me.
Dangerous. Reckless. Addictive.
By the time I hit the corner, I know I’ll circle back before dawn. Just to make sure. Just to stand in the shadows and watch her windows until the city exhales. Because monsters don’t only hide under beds. Some walk these streets, and some wear my face.
And I’ll be damned if one of them gets to her before I do.