Chapter 21
LUCIAN
“Ibrought you a coffee.”
I jerked in the uncomfortable hospital chair, Grace’s voice jarring me from the edge of sleep that the quiet beeps and hums of the equipment hooked up to Felix had lulled me into.
“Thank you.”
“Well, we can’t all look as amazing as you all the time,” I said, laughing softly.
She preened before sighing softly, really looking me over.
I fidgeted in the chair as if searching for a position that left me less exposed, knowing she saw too much.
“Why don’t we go outside and talk?”
“We can talk here. He’s sleeping,” I argued. Grace had been watching me too closely these past few days in the hospital. I sensed this as the moment she stopped waiting and pushed for a deeper conversation I wasn’t ready to have.
“Just in case. I don’t want to disturb him.”
“Yeah,” I agreed reluctantly.
Before walking out, she moved to Felix’s bedside and brushed his hair back, leaning in to press a long kiss to his cheek.
Witnessing her love for him, knowing the profound loss looming ahead, lodged a lump in my throat, and I slipped out before my composure could crack.
I sank into the chair and raked a hand down my face. Exhaustion sat heavy beneath my eyes. I’d barely slept since Grace’s call a few days ago, telling me Felix had taken a turn and was being admitted to the hospital—since she’d interrupted my attempt to chase after Aspen.
Watching Aspen walk out the door while Grace spoke in my ear had split me clean in two. One half of me was already making plans to get to my family as fast as possible. The other needed to follow the woman who’d crumpled me into aching knots with a single sentence.
In the end, going after Aspen would have been both fruitless and cruel.
I’d seen her icy facade and poked at it anyway, prodding and piercing like a boy tugging the pigtails of his first crush—desperate for any scrap of attention.
I’d gone at her like a hammer, relentless, until I shattered her defenses, unprepared for what lay beneath.
For the raw, damaged pieces she’d been trying so hard to hide.
“It won’t make it so hard to breathe that it hurts.”
My face screwed tight all over again, replaying the defeat in her words.
I hated the way my body shuddered under the weight of her pain.
Hated that I’d caused it. Hated that something inside me—calling from the corners of my mind—begged me to fix it.
And I hated that something else kept me frozen in place.
Sitting at my godfather’s bedside gave me nothing but time to think. Yet every time I turned inward, searching for a clear path forward, I was bombarded by more than I could handle.
Memories of us bled together. Making the rules of our agreement tangled with her tearful confession that she loved me.
Our laughter as she danced around the kitchen blurred into Daria taking everything from me.
The flash of Aspen’s golden eyes as I moved inside her, the soft give of her mouth against mine, twisted with the weight of her hard voice telling me we were done.
I searched for a thread to lead me in the right direction. I listened for the alarms that warned me so clearly before. But it was only chaos, and I feared I’d never find my way out.
So, instead, I sat by Felix’s side. As hard as it was to watch him, knowing he was in his final days, it was easier than facing everything tearing through me.
Grace stepped out, pulling me from my thoughts, dabbing under her eyes as she sat in the chair next to me. We each took a sip of our coffee before she exhaled, the sound low and deliberate, breaking the brewing tension without easing it.
“You know, Felix asked about Aspen earlier today?”
Though I expected it, her name struck my chest like a battering ram, sending me reeling no matter how tightly I braced. “Oh, yeah?” I asked, avoiding any details until I had a better feel for Grace’s thoughts.
“Yeah. And she’s been avoiding my calls, being vague in her responses about the wedding.”
“Hmmm…”
“You want to tell me what’s going on between you two?”
No waited on the tip of my tongue, but I didn’t bother. Against Grace and her questions, it wouldn’t stand a chance. She could give the Spanish Inquisition a run for its money.
I sipped my coffee, buying precious seconds to come up with an answer. However, my mind lagged under the stress of Felix’s decline on top of all my plans crumbling over the last few weeks. I was wrung out, and my shoulders sagged.
“We had an argument, and the marriage might be off,” I muttered, ripping the bandage off in the most childish way—like saying it fast and under my breath would make it less shocking and convince Grace to let it go.
Yeah, fucking right.
“Well, then fix it,” she stated, the words sharp and overly simplified.
My brows pulled together as I glanced at her from the corner of my eyes, unsure if she was serious.
“Listen, Lucian.” She shifted in her seat to face me better and rested her hand on mine. “First, Aspen has made you a better man. I’ve seen you happier in the past few months than I have in years. You need to do what it takes to hold onto that—onto her.”
I opened my mouth, ready to fire back with a rebuttal I hadn’t figured out yet.
“Second,” she continued, cutting me off. “I really like her, and I want to keep her friendship. I’d hate to have to abandon you to keep her friendship.”
I sank lower in my chair and frowned, on the edge of pouting. “Yeah, well, if we’re not getting married, she doesn’t have a reason to stick around.”
“Why? Because it was all a set-up to begin with?” She spoke with aloof calm, but her words landed like an atomic bomb.
My eyes shot wide as an ice-cold wave sent an electric shock vibrating through my veins.
Darkness crept around the edges of my vision, and the hallway tilted and swayed.
Slowly, I lifted my gaze to hers, unable to hide the truth—my shock too raw, too explosive to mask with a lie. “How did you know?”
Her brow lifted, and that all-knowing look cut straight through me. “Because I know you.”
I looked away, shame curling around my shoulders, pulling them in.
She squeezed my hand, and I stole a quick glance to find a reassuring smile—so much like my mom’s that my heart clenched.
Suddenly, I was ten again, caught stealing a candy bar.
My parents punished me, of course, but then soothed me when tears sprang to my eyes, terrified I’d end up in jail.
That same comfort now left me both aching for the past and embarrassed for feeling it again at almost forty.
“I saw your face the day you made that bargain with Felix. I saw the confidence that you’d never have to follow through—the hope that it would be too late before you got the chance.
Then he got sick, and I saw the panic flare when you realized a countdown had started.
” She ducked her head, trying to lock eyes with mine.
“And the man who hadn’t mentioned a woman in fifteen years, all of a sudden, is on the verge of marriage, just when Felix decided to quit treatment. ”
I swallowed. “Why didn’t you say anything?”
A small smile curved her lips, but it didn’t reach her eyes.
“Because it made Felix so happy. It gave him something else to focus on and look forward to. So, I let you continue the lie. But then, something changed. Your stoic, evasive responses softened. You softened when this mystery woman, all of a sudden, had a name—when she became real. Because you liked Aspen and it wasn’t a lie anymore. ”
“Of course, I liked her. I was going to marry her.” I scoffed, brushing aside the insinuation that Aspen had somehow softened me—that somehow, because of her, I embraced the bargain. “It might have been an arrangement, but I had to at least like her to tie myself to her.”
“I said you liked her.”
I furrowed my brows, not understanding her need to repeat that part. “Yeah…”
Her face brightened, the smile reaching her eyes. “But it’s different now.”
“Yeah,” I agreed slowly. “Because she’s ending it. We set rules, and she went against them—tried to change them, and when I wouldn’t, she threw a fit about it.”
She clicked her tongue, shaking her head in exasperation. “Lucian.”
“What? I never lied,” I defended.
“Yeah, right.” She rolled her eyes. “Not until the end. Then you just lied to yourself.”
“Myself?” I asked, my face pinched.
She pursed her lips and gently smacked my hand. “You may have liked her when all this started, but I’ve seen for myself that along the way, you’ve grown to love her.”
“No.” My back went ramrod straight, every fiber bracing—inside and out—against the accusation, against that word. “I don’t.”
“As I said, I know you,” she said, her tone returning soft and comforting. “I saw it happening.”
“No. It’s impossible.” I shook my head, my body hardening to encase the growing panic brewing inside. “Like you said, you know me. You knew everything I went through. You saw what the divorce did to me and how it changed me. You knew I never wanted to fall in love again.”
“I know, sweetheart. I know you tried not to.”
“No,” I barked. “I won’t. I refuse to be that dumb, na?ve twenty-year-old. I won’t do it.”
She chuckled. “Then don’t.”
My gaze snapped to hers, looking at her like she’d lost her mind. Accusing me of falling in love when I knew better was no laughing matter, and she talked about it as if it were nothing. “You make it sound so simple.”
“Because it is.” She paused and let out a resigned breath. “And it isn’t.”
“Well, it sure as shit wasn’t simple with Daria,” I grumbled.
“Lucian, you were in your early twenties and had an idyllic childhood. You were so lucky to witness the kind of love your parents had. You were so lucky to have that kind of hope.” She wrapped both hands around mine and hunched closer, her gaze calling mine to hers until I relented, locking onto her sincere stare.
“But life gives us lessons to learn from—some earlier than others. Your lessons came later, and that’s okay. ”