Run: 2026-02-17-01KHMZRPKGNM5GYKX6QGW168PT

The deadbolts clicked in sequence—one, two, three—and Eva's voice called through the door, "Rory, did you forget your key again?" But when the door swung open, it wasn't Eva standing in the narrow hallway. It was Lucien Moreau, his platinum hair catching the harsh fluorescent light, one amber eye and one black eye meeting hers with an expression she couldn't quite read. He held his ivory-handled cane loosely in his left hand, his charcoal suit immaculate despite the late hour. "Hello, Aurora." Her name on his lips sent an unwelcome shiver down her spine. She gripped the doorframe, her knuckles white against the chipped paint. "What are you doing here?" "May I come in?" He gestured past her into Eva's cluttered flat, where towers of books and scrolls created a maze of academic chaos. "We need to talk." "No." The word came out sharper than she intended. "Eva's not here, and you have no business—" "This isn't about Eva." His mismatched eyes held hers steady. "It's about you. About what happened in Marseille." The curry house below them was closed, the building quiet except for the distant hum of traffic on Brick Lane. Rory's pulse hammered against her throat. She hadn't seen him since that night six months ago, when everything had gone wrong and she'd fled his apartment at dawn with her shoes in her hand and her heart in pieces. "There's nothing to discuss." She moved to close the door, but he stepped forward, not quite crossing the threshold but close enough that she caught his scent—expensive cologne and something darker underneath, something that reminded her of smoke and foreign spices. "You disappeared." His voice was controlled, but she heard the edge beneath it. "One moment you were in my bed, the next you were gone. No note, no explanation. Nothing." Heat flooded her cheeks. "I don't owe you an explanation." "Don't you?" He tilted his head, studying her with that unnerving intensity she remembered too well. "After everything we shared?" Shared. As if it had been mutual, as if she hadn't been the only one caught off guard by the way he'd looked at her in the moonlight, the way his fingers had traced the small crescent scar on her wrist like it was something precious. As if she hadn't been the only one stupid enough to think it meant something. "You made it clear it was just business." She lifted her chin, meeting his gaze. "A transaction. Payment for your help with the Blackwood situation." Something flickered across his features—surprise, maybe, or hurt. But it was gone so quickly she might have imagined it. "Is that what you thought?" "It's what you said." The words tasted bitter. "After. When you thought I was asleep." She'd been lying there in his arms, still catching her breath, when his phone had buzzed on the nightstand. A client, calling about another job. She'd listened to him speak in rapid French, his voice crisp and professional, and then she'd heard him say it: "Non, it was nothing serious. Just keeping a contact satisfied. Business, you understand." Lucien's jaw tightened. "You misunderstood—" "Did I?" She stepped back into the flat, but she didn't close the door. Part of her—the part that still woke up some nights thinking about his hands in her hair—wanted to hear what he had to say. "Because it seemed pretty clear to me." He was quiet for a long moment, his fingers tapping against the ivory handle of his cane. When he spoke again, his voice was softer. "May I please come in? This isn't a conversation for the hallway." She hesitated. Every instinct screamed at her to slam the door, to pretend she'd never seen him standing there looking like sin in a tailored suit. But her curiosity had always been stronger than her self-preservation. It's what had gotten her into this mess in the first place. "Five minutes." She stepped aside, and he moved past her into Eva's cramped living room. Ptolemy, Eva's tabby cat, looked up from his perch on a stack of medieval texts and fixed Lucien with a baleful yellow stare. Lucien surveyed the chaos of books and research notes with mild interest. "Your friend has quite the collection." "She's working on her doctorate." Rory closed the door but didn't lock it—a small act of defiance, a reminder that this was temporary. "Four minutes." He turned to face her, and in the warm light of Eva's reading lamps, his heterochromatic eyes seemed less alien, more human. "I came to London because I heard you were in trouble." Her heart skipped. "What kind of trouble?" "The kind that involves your ex-boyfriend and a very angry pack of London werewolves." His expression was grim. "Word travels fast in our circles, Aurora. Evan's been asking questions, making threats. Someone's going to get hurt." The blood drained from her face. She'd been so careful, so certain she'd covered her tracks when she'd fled Cardiff. But Evan had always been persistent, and now that she thought about it, there had been signs—the feeling of being watched, the hang-up calls at the restaurant. "How do you know about Evan?" "Because three days ago he tried to hire me to find you." Lucien's voice was deadly quiet. "He was very specific about what he wanted to do when I brought you back." The room tilted. She sank into Eva's reading chair, her legs suddenly unsteady. "What did you tell him?" "I told him I don't take jobs that involve harming women." He moved closer, his cane tapping softly against the hardwood floor. "Then I told him that if I saw him in London again, I'd introduce him to some friends of mine who are less concerned with ethical boundaries." Despite everything, a small smile tugged at her lips. "Let me guess—demon friends?" "The worst kind." His mouth quirked upward, and for a moment he looked almost boyish. "My father's associates aren't known for their restraint." The silence stretched between them, heavy with unspoken words. Ptolemy hopped down from his book tower and padded over to Lucien, rubbing against his legs with surprising affection. Traitor cat. "Three minutes," Rory said, but her heart wasn't in it anymore. Lucien crouched to scratch behind Ptolemy's ears, and the gesture was so unexpectedly gentle that something loosened in her chest. "I need you to know," he said without looking up, "that conversation you overheard—it wasn't about you." "Lucien—" "I was talking about a job I'd turned down earlier that week. A woman in Marseille wanted me to seduce information out of her husband's business partner." He stood, his eyes finding hers. "I told the client I don't work that way. That intimacy isn't something I use as currency." The words hit her like a physical blow. She pressed her hand to her mouth, remembering the hurt and humiliation that had driven her from his bed, the assumption that had felt so obviously true in the darkness. "I thought—" Her voice came out as a whisper. "God, I thought you were talking about me. About what we'd done." "Never." The word was fierce, absolute. "What happened between us had nothing to do with business. Nothing to do with the job or the favor you owed me." He took a step closer, close enough that she could see the flecks of gold in his amber eye. "It was the first real thing I'd felt in years." Her chest ached. "Then why didn't you come after me?" "Because you ran." His smile was sad, self-deprecating. "And I've learned that when someone runs from me, there's usually a good reason. I thought perhaps you'd realized what I was—what I am—and decided you wanted no part of it." "What you are?" He gestured to his mismatched eyes, his pale skin. "Half-demon isn't exactly what most women bring home to meet their parents." She almost laughed. "Lucien, my ex-boyfriend is apparently stalking me with the help of werewolves. I think I'm past worrying about normal." Something shifted in his expression—hope, maybe, or relief. "Are you?" The question hung between them, loaded with possibility. Outside, a siren wailed in the distance, and the smell of spices from the curry house below drifted up through the floorboards. Ptolemy purred against Lucien's legs, the traitor. Rory stood, closing the distance between them until she could see the slight tremor in his hands, the vulnerability he tried so hard to hide behind expensive suits and careful words. "For the record," she said, "I didn't run because of what you are. I ran because I was falling in love with you, and I thought you saw me as just another job." His breath hitched. "Aurora—" She reached up and touched his face, her fingers tracing the sharp line of his jaw. "My friends call me Rory." "Rory." He leaned into her touch, his eyes fluttering closed. "I've missed the sound of your voice." "Have you?" She stepped closer, until she could feel the warmth radiating from his body. "What else have you missed?" When he opened his eyes, they were dark with want. "Everything. Your laugh. The way you bite your lip when you're thinking. The little scar on your wrist." His fingers found it, tracing the crescent shape with reverent gentleness. "The way you taste." Her pulse hammered in her throat. "Lucien—" "Tell me to leave," he whispered against her temple. "Tell me to go, and I will. I'll handle Evan from a distance, make sure you're safe without interfering in your life. But if you ask me to stay..." She pulled back to meet his gaze, her decision crystallizing like ice. "Stay."