Chapter 32 #3
The plan is dead. I know it in my gut. He was supposed to pick wrong. He was supposed to guess and miss and seal a contract that wouldn’t take. Instead, he looked straight through all five of us and reached for me, leaving no trick to hide behind.
Because he didn’t choose Tessa, he chose me, knowing whose soul he was choosing.
His smile turns even brighter when he sees the realization land. I said it myself. He didn’t really want Tessa, the same way she didn’t really want him.
He just doesn’t want to be alone.
That’s the whole point of this, isn’t it? It’s why I came here in the first place, driving across the country.
But his promises are gone. Tessa could leave here and wake up.
Hell, I could turn and leave, too, but none of what we did took that loneliness out of him, and him out of the dark.
He’s still here. Still in a different league than all of us combined.
Still able to walk into any dream he wants, uninvited, the way he’s done for years with Paul’s nightmares, Ridge’s trauma, and Nevan’s dangerous sleepwalks.
Releasing the promises didn’t make him gone. It made him come loose.
We could wake up. We could all claw our way to the surface right now and open our eyes in the waking world.
And then, for the rest of our lives, he would follow us to bed.
Haunting and torturing us every single night.
Paul’s paralysis. Ridge trapped, crushed under that log.
And Nevan.
He would strike Nevan first. I know it in my soul. We would all stay awake for days, fearing sleep, until we finally succumbed, and Nevan would be his first target. Windows, traffic, and bodies of water.
So many places he could send Nevan that could harm him or worse.
Waking up doesn’t end him. Waking up only postpones him.
There’s only one thing that ever settles a man like this, and Seraphine told me what it was without me understanding I was being told.
“Everything costs something.”
The single thing he’s ever wanted is for someone to choose to stay in paradise with him. Give him that, and he stops reaching and hunting. He simply stops.
He doesn’t want Tessa anymore because even he noticed that deep down, she didn’t want to stay. Not really. So, he stripped off my mask and reached for me.
“Sometimes we have to sacrifice ourselves for the people we love.”
I traveled three thousand miles to get to my best friend, and the bill for setting her free is my whole life.
I almost laugh.
I’ve already decided to make that sacrifice once, haven’t I?
So why does it feel so much harder now?
I can feel my men’s eyes on me. I can feel them waiting for me to make a move so we can get the fuck out of here, but I don’t turn around because if I see their faces, I won’t be able to do this.
I think about my mother. About the lemon cake, the shoebox of cards, and the fact that now, I will never get to be done grieving her, because you have to be awake to finish a thing like that.
I think about the kitchen in the inn with the steel counter I run my hand along to make sure the world is solid. I think about the restaurant notebook. About how Nevan said the inn’s restaurant could be ours. Whatever you want it to be, with whoever you want, as long as you’re here.
As long as I’m here.
I think about how, last night, lying on Ridge’s chest with all three of them breathing around me, I let myself think the words.
Maybe after, I can have the life of my dreams.
The life of my dreams.
What a thing to almost have.
If I stay, they all go home. Ridge wakes up and writes his terrible romance. Paul gets to keep the lights on in a house that isn’t empty. Nevan gets the inn. Jasper gets his brother. Tessa gets Derek.
And I’ll be here.
But I’ll be fine.
I held my mother’s whole death in my hands without breaking, so I can hold this. I can be the one who pays. I’m good at being the one who takes care of it.
I’ve been practicing my entire life.
“Sometimes we have to sacrifice ourselves for the people we love.”
I’ve been doing that my whole life, too, haven’t I?
I take a deep breath and square my shoulders.
Lucien smiles down at me, and for once, there’s nothing wrong in it at all. For once, he looks like a lonely man who built something beautiful and has been waiting a very long time for someone to choose to stay in it with him.
“It will be good, Lenny,” he says softly, meaning it. “I promise you. It will be more than good. You will learn to love it.”
I don’t want to think that, so I think about them instead.
Ridge, who crossed a hall for me.
Paul, who waited years for me.
Nevan, who made me smile again.
Tessa, who let Derek hold her hand.
Our future together. All the dinners we were going to have, gathered around Paul’s table with laughter and love.
They’ll wake up and be safe. Every one of them. And they’ll stay safe for good. Not only for tonight, but forever, because Lucien will have what he has always wanted. He’ll have no reason left to come for any of them.
Lucien knows my soul. He knows exactly who I am, which means when I put my hand in his, it will hold, it will take, it will be real, permanent, and done.
Good.
Let it hold.
Let them be free of him.
He can take my forever, but he’ll never understand what I’m giving it up for.
I grasp his hand.