Chapter 45
Chapter Forty-Five
LUCA
The knife was steady in my hand.The rest of me wasn’t.
I’d lined the counter like I was staging an operation. Chicken brined. Lemon segments waiting in a glass. Vegetables in neat diagonals that would’ve passed inspection at Ember it was about belonging. I stepped in, hips to the counter, careful with her.
“You’re going to listen now,” I said. “Not to the city. Not to old rules. To me.” I waited for her nod. “Good girl. Breathe.”
I talked her through it. In for three. Hold for two. Out for four. Again. My voice stayed low and even until her shoulders fell, until she stopped trying to be strong. I brushed my knuckles under her chin.
“That’s it. You’re doing perfect.”
“Luca.”
“Mm.”
“I’m sorry.”
“And I love you,” I put my mouth to her hairline. “I’m proud of you for staying.”
Her breath stuttered—one of those tiny breaking sounds that meant praise had landed where it should. I kept going.
“Baby, you’re safe now. Daddy’s got you.” I kissed her softly. “You hear me?”
A small sound. “Yes.”
“Say it back. ”
“I’m safe,” she whispered. “You’ve got me.”
“Good girl.” I kissed her jaw. “You’re ours. You don’t go anywhere we can’t reach you.”
She was softer now, shoulders relaxed. I slid one hand down, pressed it flat over her sternum, feeling her heart beat. “This. All mine to keep steady. Let me.”
She nodded again. The movement brushed her mouth against my cheek.
“I was ashamed,” I said into her hair. “Of losing control. Of how easy it was to give the city what it wanted from me.” The truth wasn’t gentle, but I gave it gentle anyway. “I didn’t look because I didn’t want to see my worst self reflected back.”
She pulled back enough to meet my eyes. “Look now.”
I did. What looked back wasn’t fear. It was clear. There were tears, but they were the kind that come after a thing survives, not before it breaks. It undid me in the way that made me steadier.
She pushed her forehead to my mouth as if to hide it. I let her.
My hands tightened. “And this—” I tapped the island with two fingers. “This isn’t where goodbyes live anymore.”
“Where do they live?”
“They don’t,” I said. “Not for us.”
She inhaled like something heavy had been taken off her and then slid her hands along my jaw. “Show me,” she whispered. “Make this a different memory.”
I smiled then, small, because she’d just given me the exact order I needed.
“Look at me. Just me. Listen.” I murmured.
I told her what I loved.
About the way she went quiet before she laughed. The small crease that showed up across her nose when she was concentrating. The way her hands always found a wrist when she was overwhelmed, as if searching for a pulse to match.
I told her about the weight of her head on my shoulder and how the city stopped screaming when she did it. I told her she was ours, and that ours wasn’t a threat—it was a promise of where she would never fall.
“Baby, you were made for our hands,” I said. “Not to be used. To be held.”
Her breath hitched at that. I felt it on my mouth, because we were close enough now that every sound had heat.
Her fingers slid into my hair.
Possession wasn’t only the story we told about her. It was the story she told back, in small touches, in the way she climbed into my space and stayed. She tugged me closer.
“Talk to me,” I said. “Tell me what you need.”
“Just you.”
“Then I’m here. Always.”
She nodded against my cheek.
“Lay back,”
She leaned into my hands and let me guide, not force. I stayed standing, careful, my hands mapping her.
Worship isn’t a metaphor. It’s technique. It’s patience.
“Eyes on me. Good girl. That’s it. Breathe.”
I kissed her like a man memorizing. Not hungry. A slow sequence written into skin, temple, cheekbone, mouth, the soft line of her throat—where my favorite sound in the world lived, her pulse.
Each place earned a yes from her breath before I took the next.
“Perfect. You’re perfect. Ours, always ours.”
Her chest lifted. Fell. I heard the small sound that meant her head had gone quiet.
I could have said a hundred other things. I didn’t. I stayed with praise because praise was the only language she never had to translate.
I told her she was a good girl each time she matched my breath.
I told her she was safe when her hands loosened where they’d been holding too tight.
I told her she was mine when her voice dropped into that soft place I’d waited months to hear again.
And when her eyes filled and tipped, I caught it with my mouth and said, There you are. That’s my girl.
“Come here,” I said finally, easing her upright, bracing her with a hand at the back of her head.
She dropped into my chest. I anchored her with my arms.
“I’m ashamed of the other night,” I told her again, pressing my mouth to the top of her head. “Not because I didn’t mean it. Because I let it make a liar out of the future I promised you.”
“What future?”
“The one where you don’t have to be afraid of what the city turns me into,” I said. “The one where I give you the man before I pick up the monster.”
The future where I control the crow, not the crow controls me.
“You’ve always given me the man,”
I shook my head. “Not always. But I will.”
She tipped back enough to look at me. “How?”
“By letting you see me first,” I said. “By telling you when I’m fraying instead of making you feel it. By eating the food I make instead of pretending I don’t need any. By remembering I don’t have to carry the entire city to keep you safe.”
She smiled, small and adorable. And fuck, I had missed it.
“Good girl,” I traced her lip with my thumb. “There she is.”
I set her on a stool and plated dinner like a man who finally remembered the point of food. When I set it in front of her, she took one bite and made the sound that has broken me since we were teenagers at the academy. I leaned on the counter .
We ate in silence. When she finished, I kissed the corner of her mouth.
“Come to bed,” she said.
My body said finally . My ribs said careful . My head said thank God . But I kept my eyes on hers and made sure the only answer that mattered got there first.
“Okay, baby,”
She slid her hand into mine. I turned off the lights. I led her down the hall.
I undressed her slowly, with kisses as checkpoints. Because undressing her was sacred.
When I laid her down, I stayed above her, my hands by her shoulders.
“Tell me you hear me,” I whispered.
“I hear you.”
“Tell me you’re safe.”
“I’m safe.”
“Tell me I’m yours.”
“You’re mine,” she smiled.
I lowered my head and kissed her, worship first, always worship.
Now I was going to take her slow.
And when she finally fell asleep with her face tucked against my throat, I stayed awake. Listening to my favourite sound.
Everyone else gets the monster.
She gets me.