Chapter 11 Lucian
Lucian
The phone rings, sharp and insistent, cutting through sleep like a blade.
I jolt awake, disoriented, tangled in sheets that feel heavier than they should.
My braid has come undone sometime in the night, hair sticking to my jaw and neck, my shoulder damp with sweat.
My residual limb throbs with that familiar, stubborn ache like it’s checking in to make sure I haven’t forgotten it exists.
My knee isn’t much better. I pushed too hard yesterday, and my body is keeping receipts.
I squint at the clock on the nightstand.
4:59 a.m.
You’ve got to be kidding me.
The phone keeps ringing.
I groan, roll onto my back, and fumble for the receiver, forcing myself upright before bringing it to my ear. “Yeah?”
A voice far too cheerful for this hour chirps back. “Good morning! This is Ms. Lucy’s five a.m. wake-up call!”
My brain stalls completely. “What?”
“Mr. Smith requested we give Lucy a call to make sure she’s up and dressed. The car service is scheduled to pick her up in thirty minutes.”
My eye twitches. “Did you say, Lucy?”
“Mr. Smith requested we make sure Lucy is up and dressed! The car service arrives at 5:30. He left a very detailed note if you’d like me to—”
“No,” I cut in, voice rough. “That won’t be necessary.”
“Wonderful! Enjoy your day!”
Click.
I lower the phone and scrub my hands over my face, dragging my palms down until my fingers hook in my hair.
Of course it’s Orion. He must’ve slipped out in the middle of the night, because he knows damn well this is the only way he’d get me moving without a drawn-out argument and at least one credible threat of violence.
I flick on the bedside lamp.
An unfamiliar suitcase sits on the bed with a square of hotel stationery resting on top.
A note. Of course, because the wake-up call wasn’t enough.
Lucy.
This suitcase is filled with shit I stole from your place. Your car will be here at 5:30. Get your ass out of bed.
-O
I mutter every curse I know as I swing my legs over the side of the bed, the words low and automatic, more habit than heat. My body feels heavy, sluggish with sleep and nerves. This early in the morning, everything aches a half-second before it moves.
Lucy.
I scowl at the space near the phone. I hate that nickname. Somewhere downstairs, some poor hotel employee probably thought he was waking a woman and had no idea he’d just committed a minor act of psychological warfare instead.
Before I can dwell on it, a familiar weight lands on the bed.
Sir Sass hops up and crosses my legs with deliberate care, pads over my thighs, and purrs immediately, loud and satisfied, the sound vibrating straight through my bones.
I look down at him. “Do I really seem that stressed out?”
He answers by leaning forward and nuzzling my chin, then purring harder, as if that settles the matter completely.
Great, I’m being emotionally blackmailed by my best friend and a three-legged cat with abandonment issues.
I ease him aside and stand, pausing long enough to find my balance before moving toward the chair where I left everything laid out the night before.
The carpet is cold under my foot as I roll the silicone liner into place, smoothing it carefully, making sure there’s no twist or pinch before guiding my limb into the socket.
I shift my weight, letting my weight settle and the pressure distribute the way it’s supposed to.
There’s a quiet click as the suspension engages.
Seven months ago, this process felt like proof of everything I’d lost.
Now it feels like proof that I’m still here.
I let myself stand there for a second longer than necessary, caught between the temptation to crawl back into bed and the heavier truth that avoidance has never actually protected me from anything.
My therapist’s voice cuts in, uninvited but annoyingly accurate.
“Your worth didn’t fall off with your leg. You want to find connection again? Go earn it.”
I pull on my jeans, rake my fingers through my hair, and twist it into a low knot.
Every movement pulls at memory, Celeste threaded through muscle and instinct in ways I never managed to unlearn.
Her laugh flashes through me without warning.
The way she burned pancakes so badly once that we had to open every window in my apartment, and still laughed about it for days.
I try to shove it all away, but it shoves back.
When I catch my reflection in the mirror, I don’t see the man I used to measure myself against. I don’t see a before-and-after split clean enough to define. I just see myself standing just as tall as I did before the car bomb, but now I have a few more scars and a carbon fiber lower leg.
Last night proved the biggest thing that hasn’t changed is that I am still stupidly, painfully in love with her.
For the first time in seven months, the thought doesn’t break me.
Maybe this is the moment my therapist keeps circling. The thin line between who I was and who I’m choosing to be. Not because I’m healed or because I’m suddenly fearless, but because I’m done letting fear make my decisions.
“Show up. Then keep showing up.”
That was another one of his gems.
Fine.
I can show up.
Grabbing my go-bag, I sling it over my shoulder and yank the suitcase off the bed before I do one last look around the room.
Sass immediately hops off the bed and trots over, climbing into the backpack like this was always the plan, and he didn’t loathe it yesterday.
He pokes his head through the little porthole and stares at me.
“Don’t look at me like you know everything,” I mutter.
He blinks at me slowly, like he absolutely knows everything.
The hallway is quiet as I step out, the hotel still half-asleep, and the elevator doors slide open with a soft chime.
I step inside and let the doors close behind me, sealing me into the hum and glow of fluorescent light that’s far too bright for a morning that hasn’t fully arrived yet.
The car starts its descent, smooth and steady, and the motion gives my thoughts something to press against instead of letting them spin completely out of control.
It doesn’t help much; she’s everywhere in my head.
Not in the memories I’ve replayed a thousand times already, but the unanswered space between us. The version of me she’s about to see. The question I’m not sure I’m ready to hear answered—whether she’ll recognize the man I’ve been fighting to become.
I want to show her that I can stand beside her without breaking. That I don’t crumble at the edges anymore. I need to show her that losing my leg didn’t carve my future out from under me, or leave me unfinished or fragile. I’m still capable. Still strong.
And still hers—if she’ll ever let me be again.
The doubt slips in anyway, quiet and insidious. Were we even together long enough for her to fall the way I did? Or was I always ahead of her, already planning a future she hadn’t fully stepped into yet?
No. I don’t let myself spiral there.
That’s the past, and I’ve spent seven months learning how to stop living in it. I’m done trying to rewrite what already happened. If there’s anything left for us, it has to be built forward, not backward. I rub a hand down my face, exhaling slowly at the thought.
What I can’t ignore is the look in her eyes last night.
The restraint that somehow sharpened into something brittle.
The anger she held just beneath the surface and what looked like heartbreak she kept tucked so carefully out of reach, like letting it show would cost her something she couldn’t afford to lose.
If she hates me for what I did, I won’t argue. I made the decision for both of us and had convinced myself I was being noble instead of terrified. I told myself I was protecting her when what I was really doing was protecting my pride, my fear, and my inability to let her see me fall apart.
Therapy stripped that lie down to the bone.
Walking back into her world now—her real world, not the quiet half-life we shared in stolen moments—sets something restless stirring in my chest. It isn’t hope exactly. It’s closer to inevitability. Like I’ve been running in a circle and only just realized where it ends.
Maybe the universe is pushing us together again.
The thought is ridiculous. I don’t believe in signs or fate or cosmic timing; I barely trust my GPS. But standing here, descending toward her, I can’t shake the feeling that I’ve been brought back to the exact place I stopped moving forward.
The elevator dings, the doors slide open onto the lobby, and I step out.
My shoulders tighten, and my breath suddenly too deep in my lungs.
The hotel is bright and polished and quiet, a stark contrast to the dark-blue sky waiting beyond the glass doors.
Cool air hits my face the second I step outside, grounding me, waking me all the way up.
A black SUV pulls to the curb right in front of me, and I check my watch to see if it could be mine, then straighten my shoulders and greet the driver, confirming this is my ride.
He opens the door for me, letting me slide in before he gets back into the SUV and drives away.
My phone buzzes in my pocket before we are out of the parking lot.
Matt’s name lights up my phone. The man has a sixth sense for bad timing and emotional landmines, honed over a lifetime of being my older brother.
I answer before it can ring again. “You good?”
“I’m good,” he says easily, and I can hear the grin in his voice. “The better question is—are you?”
I stare out the window as Nashville glides by in soft, early-morning blurs. “Define ‘good.’”
“Oh, so we’re doing cryptic this morning. Cool, cool. Love that for me. I woke up with this weird prickle between my shoulder blades—like my little brother was either spiraling or about to do something profoundly stupid. Would you like to confirm or deny?”
I rub at my jaw, feeling the tension there. “I wouldn’t say ‘stupid’. At least not yet.”
“That is aggressively not reassuring.”
I exhale through my nose. “I took a contract.”
There’s a beat of silence. “Okay,” he says slowly. “That’s… actually good news. I was worried you joined a pyramid scheme or decided to become a motivational speaker. What kind of contract?”
“Just a temporary security detail.”
“Lu, that’s not stupid—that’s normal. I’m proud of you.” He pauses before asking his next question. “Wait. Who for?”
My grip tightens on the phone as I brace myself for his reaction. “…Umbra.”
The silence on the other end is immediate and total, like the call dropped into a vacuum.
Then—
“UM—brA?” Matt shouts. “Umbra as in Umbra? The concert that sold out stadiums for their world tour, Umbra? The band with the masks and the vocals that make people cry in public bathrooms? That Umbra?!”
My eye twitches. “Yes. That Umbra.”
“Holy shit! Lucian, do you know how big a deal that is?” He’s practically wheezing. “They have, like, Navy SEAL-level security. Did you get recruited through a shadowy email? Did they send a raven? Was there a blood oath?”
Dragging a hand down my face, I force myself to remember how to be patient with my brother. “Matt.”
“What? I’m processing. You worked federal law enforcement for a decade, and this is the thing that finally makes me starstruck.” There’s a pause before suspicion creeps into his tone. “Why are you all monotone and ‘yes, that Umbra.’ Where is your enthusiasm?!”
I stare harder out the window. “Because it’s early.”
“Bullshit,” he says immediately. “No, that’s not it. You only go emotionally beige when a certain blonde is involved.”
I don’t know what he’s talking about. I’m a fucking ray of sunshine 24/7.
On the other end of the line, Matt inhales sharply, like he felt the weight shift before I even spoke.
There it is.
“Okay, so I obviously just remembered she works for them,” he snaps, then softens. “Are you worried about seeing her?”
Silence stretches long enough for him to answer himself.
“Oh God,” he murmurs. “Oh no. You are.”
I close my eyes.
“You might get to see her again,” he says, voice dropping. “Lucian… why aren’t you freaking out with me right now?”
I swallow. “I’m fine.”
“False,” he says instantly. “Try again.”
“I can handle it.”
“Oh, we know that,” he says, gentler now. “But can you handle her?”
The question lands right where it hurts.
Her face flashes in my mind. Her voice, and the way she looked at me last night—controlled, distant, like I was a problem she’d already solved and filed away.
“I don’t know,” I admit.
Matt is quiet for a moment. “You still love her,” he says it as a statement and not a question.
I don’t answer; my silence speaks for itself.
“You don’t have to say it. I’ve known since I saw you in the hospital, and for the first time, you said her name like it hurt.
Lucian… you’re going to see her, and after everything you’ve been through, you deserve to walk in there standing tall.
Not like you’re half of something, or like you’re less than. ”
I close my eyes and lean my head back as I take in his words,
He keeps going, softer still. “Your worth isn’t tied to your missing limb. Or the one bad moment in a hospital bed. You’ve been rebuilding yourself for months. Maybe this is the moment you get to show her that.”
The SUV rolls onto gravel and into a world that looks like a town built overnight.
String lights hang between RVs like their own constellations.
Orion told me the entire campground was booked months ago, so they could hire security to make sure no one could get into the area without the right credentials.
We pass through security easily enough, and I watch the fence slide past the window and think about how carefully everything has been arranged. Matt exhales, interrupting my thoughts. “Just tell me one thing.”
“Yeah?”
“Do you think you can be the man she deserves now?”
I swallow hard, thinking about how far I’ve come since that day in the hospital. “I’m trying.”
“That’s all you can do,” he says. “And hey… maybe this time, don’t push her away.”
A breath escapes me, halfway between a laugh and a groan. “No promises.”
“Make one,” he says. “Even if it’s just to yourself.”
The SUV rolls to a stop in front of a long line of RVs.
“Go get her, Lucian,” Matt says quietly. “Or at least… don’t lose yourself before you try.”
The line goes dead, and I sit for a beat, my eyes fixed out the window while the campsite sleeps around me.
I let the silence sit around me as I count my breaths before opening the door. I step out and walk toward Celeste, each footfall measured and inevitable.