Chapter 22
Sadie
Lucan seems distant on the brief drive to his building, even for him. His fist clenches the steering wheel of his liquid-black car as if he’s furious, yet his expression is like a marble statue’s.
“Are you angry at me?” I ask.
“No,” he says, spinning the steering wheel with one hand. “I’m angry at myself for letting you disappear. I’m angry at that bastard for coming after you again. I’m not doing enough.”
I hesitate to respond, because what more could he do? Probably some rich-person thing I can’t even imagine.
“That’s twice he’s tried though,” I say. “And he failed.”
“Barely failed. He only needs to succeed once and you’re gone forever.”
He says the last part in a hollow voice instead of his usual stern tone, as if the thought really bothers him.
“For tonight, he’s not a threat,” I say. “He would’ve run a mile when he saw all those agents.”
“You would think so, but I’m not taking any chances,” says Lucan.
I retrieve my phone to find several messages from Juliette and Clara. I quickly reply, telling them I’m okay and heading to Lucan’s place. My friends respond with long strings of lewd, inappropriate emojis. Feeling Lucan’s gaze on me, I hastily dim the phone screen.
It’s too late though. He’s already seen the eggplant and water-splash images my friends sent.
“Anything important?” he asks with a mocking tone.
I stuff the phone in my bag. “Nothing you need to know about.”
On a quiet street, he pulls the car into an unmarked garage. When I reach for the car-door handle, needing air, Lucan holds my arm.
“Wait,” he says.
Behind the car, the garage door slides shut with a solid, airtight thunk.
“That’s not a normal door, is it?” I have the sudden, unpleasant sensation of being trapped. “What’s going on?”
“I’d tell you, but I don’t feel like it.”
“God, you’re an asshole.”
The floor softly hums beneath the car, just enough that I feel it in my bones. Then comes a gradual, impossible shift, like we’ve become somehow weightless.
“Is this a time machine or something?” I ask.
“Or something.”
I grip the armrest. “I never should’ve agreed to come to your lair.”
This was a mistake. The last time he got me alone it ended with me on my knees, tears streaming down my face and my underwear soaked.
“You didn’t actually agree,” he says. “If it makes you feel any better.”
“It doesn’t.”
With an odd humming, the room around us moves, despite the car remaining still.
“Are we—”
“Going up,” he says lazily, like people regularly drive into buildings and rise like gods.
The ascension is slow and steady. With no external windows, the journey is disorienting.
When the upward motion stops, a wall splits in front of the vehicle to reveal a foyer.
“A car elevator,” I say. “You have a car elevator.”
“You’re surprised I have one?” he asks.
“I’m surprised they exist. I had no idea.”
“Now you know.”
Lucan opens my door, and I step into the soundless, polished space with nerves jangling.
If I wanted to flee, how would I even manage it? Steal his car?
One glass wall overlooks the glimmering town below. The room is otherwise only concrete, polished to a sheen.
Standing there, surrounded by a deep silence, I realize that wealth is more than I thought.
It’s the obvious things like freedom, choice, luxury. All of that.
But also control. Power. Isolation.
I feel as though I understand more about Lucan by being here, enveloped in this feeling that’s both calming and eerie.
“Do you like it?” he asks from behind me.
Somehow I know he doesn’t mean the shining glass and sky-high space.
He means the feeling.
“Yeah, I think I do,” I say softly. “It’s like another realm or dimension. Like time’s suspended.”
He’s silent for a moment. “I knew you’d get it.”
“Um?” Arching my brow, I face him. “How did you know I’d ever be in your apartment?”
“This isn’t my apartment, it’s the entrance.”
“Smartass.”
Lucan crosses to a concrete wall, where a door opens before he touches it, like magic.
“Come inside,” he says.
The apartment’s interior is dark in a way that can only be intentional. It’s all low lighting, black everything, sharp lines, glass, steel.
It’s so perfect that I’m struck with the desire to put my hand on a shiny surface to leave a palm print. Some evidence of humanity. Because as it is, there’s none.
“Status?” asks Lucan, removing his jacket as we enter the kitchen.
Dumbfounded, I blink. “What?”
But then a disembodied voice answers him, coming from invisible speakers.
“Welcome back,” says the smooth, neutral voice that’s not quite human. “Perimeter secure. Breaches in your absence: zero. Your night schedule is cleared.”
His home is run by an operating system. Lucky, otherwise he might be at risk of human connection.
“You have a night schedule?” I ask.
Lucan loosens his black tie, letting it hang around his neck. “Everyone does.”
“Right, but I bet yours is very different to mine.”
“It is.”
My stomach tightens, because he does have some idea of my schedule. He can watch me come and go from my dorm on the doorbell camera.
“What?” he asks, noticing my pensive expression.
“I just realized you know about my late-night habit. All that cookie-dough ice cream from the campus market.”
“It’s not a habit.”
“What do you mean?”
“You only go when you’ve had a difficult day,” he says.
His observation short-circuits my brain for a second. The idea of someone paying such close attention to my actions is surreal.
Not just my actions, but the reason behind them. Lucan noticed something about me that I barely knew myself.
What else does he know? How often does he watch me on the cameras? It’s like I’m featuring in a reality television show, with an audience of one.
“So what now?” I drum my fingertips on the kitchen counter to release some nervous energy. “You sit on the porch with a shotgun all night?”
“That won’t be necessary. Nobody’s getting to you in here.”
I believe no one can get in, but the isolation also makes me a little uneasy. I’m so alone with him up here. Sealed off, high in the sky.
He walks toward me, and I back away instinctively, but when he draws level, he keeps walking down a hallway that looks like a portal.
“Let’s have a drink,” he says.
Exhaling, I go after him.
Lucan takes me to a living room of stone, matte-black steel, and smoked glass. It smells faintly of his cologne and nothing else.
While he pours whiskey at the drinks cart, I gravitate to the spartan concrete shelving, which holds mostly abstract ornaments.
But I also spy a battered paperback tucked behind a black granite cube, the yellowed pages barely peeking out. My heart warms at the familiar, comforting sight of a book, and I pick it up to read the title.
“The Stranger.” I flip to the back to skim the blurb. “I haven’t read this one, but it’s about a guy who goes on trial for randomly murdering a man, right?”
Lucan gives a one-shoulder shrug as he passes me a crystal tumbler. He sits on the leather lounge and takes a lazy draw of his drink.
“Yeah,” he says.
“You’ve read it?” I ask.
“Once or twice.”
“But why? Why do you like it?”
He shrugs again. For some reason, irritation nips at me.
Drinking the burning whiskey, I begin to understand why. “You never tell me anything real about yourself. You have no problem invading my privacy, but you’re a total mystery to me. It’s unfair.”
Lucan’s a billionaire. He can do anything he likes, whenever he likes. Judging by the worn pages and cracked spine of this book, he elected to spend many hours with this story.
I want to know why.
Placing the book on the coffee table, I perch on the edge of the sofa. My bag’s still on my shoulder, because I’m mostly sure I won’t need to use the stun gun on him tonight, but mostly isn’t definitely.
Lucan removes his cufflinks and puts them on a side table with a clink. He rolls his shirt cuffs over his forearms, the cords of his muscles visible under his skin. The shadow-filled room is so quiet I’m sure he can hear my pulse thudding.
“You’re right. You should know more about me.” He stares at The Stranger, inhaling through his nose like he’s gearing up for something. “You really want to know why I’ve read that book so many times?”