Run: 2026-02-19-01KHT0KCGGFCZHPTKTD3DPRH55

The door swung open and Aurora's stomach dropped. Lucien stood in the threshold, one hand still raised as if to knock again, the other gripping that damned ivory-handled cane. Rain had darkened the shoulders of his charcoal suit. Water dripped from the platinum strands that had escaped their usual severe styling. "Bonsoir, chérie." His mismatched eyes—amber and black—swept over her ratty Cardiff University jumper and bare feet. "I hope I am not interrupting." "You are." Aurora planted herself in the doorway, blocking his view of Eva's cluttered flat. Behind her, Ptolemy meowed, probably perched on some precarious stack of occult manuscripts. "How did you even know I was here?" "I am exceptionally good at my job." "That's not an answer." "It is the only one you will receive." He tilted his head, rainwater sliding down his sharp cheekbone. "May I come in? Or shall we conduct our business where the entire street can observe?" Business. Right. Because that's all they'd ever been. A fixer and his temporarily useful asset. Never mind the night in his Kensington flat three months ago when business had blurred into something else entirely. Never mind how his mouth had traced the crescent scar on her wrist, or how he'd whispered her name like a prayer in a language she didn't know. Never mind how she'd woken to find him gone, nothing but a note in his precise handwriting: *This was a mistake.* "There's a pub two streets over." Aurora kept her voice level. "We can talk there." "I would prefer privacy." "And I'd prefer you hadn't shown up unannounced." Something flickered across his expression—too quick to name. "Fair enough." He stepped back, rain immediately soaking through his hair. "The pub, then." She should have said yes. Should have grabbed her jacket and trainers and met him on neutral ground. Instead she heard herself say, "Wait." He paused on the threshold. "You'll drip all over the curry house stairs." The excuse sounded weak even to her own ears. "Just—come in. Five minutes." Lucien's mouth curved, not quite a smile. "How generous." She moved aside. He crossed into Eva's cramped entrance, and the space contracted around him. He'd always had that effect—filling rooms, demanding attention without saying a word. Aurora engaged two of the three deadbolts, leaving one open. Escape route. Old habit. "Eva is not here?" He glanced at the towers of books threatening to avalanche off the kitchen counter. "She's in Oxford. Research trip." Aurora crossed her arms. "What do you want, Lucien?" "Your expertise." "My expertise." She barked a laugh. "I'm a delivery driver who occasionally translates dead languages. You've got a dozen people more qualified than—" "I need someone I can trust." The words hung between them. Ptolemy chose that moment to wind around Lucien's legs, purring like a motorboat. Traitor. "Trust." Aurora tasted the word, found it bitter. "That's rich." "I deserve that." "You deserve worse than that." She moved into the kitchenette, needing distance. "You used me to get information on Silas' supplier network. You got what you wanted. Then you—" She stopped, biting down on words she refused to give him. "We're done." "What happened between us—" He set the cane against the wall, something he never did. Always kept it close. Always prepared. "It was not supposed to happen." "Brilliant deduction. You made that abundantly clear in your goodbye note." "I had my reasons." "Everyone has reasons." She grabbed two mugs from the drainer, just for something to do with her hands. "Doesn't make them good ones." "My father sent an assassin after my mother." The words came flat, stripped of his usual eloquence. "When I was eight years old. He wanted to ensure I would have no ties to the human world. No weaknesses." Aurora's hands stilled on the mugs. "He failed, obviously. But the lesson remained." Lucien's reflection wavered in the dark window behind her. "People close to me become targets. It is the nature of what I am." "Half-demon." She turned, meeting his eyes. "I know what you are, Luc. I knew that night." "Knowing and understanding are different things." "So you just decided for me? Decided I couldn't handle it?" Heat crept up her throat. "I've been running from things my whole life. My family. Evan. Myself. I didn't need you to protect me from you." "I was not protecting you." His voice dropped, rougher than she'd ever heard it. "I was protecting myself from wanting you too much." The admission sucked the air from the room. Ptolemy jumped onto the counter. Outside, a siren wailed past. Aurora's heart hammered against her ribs, loud enough she wondered if he could hear it with whatever supernatural senses he possessed. "That's not fair." Her voice came out smaller than intended. "No. It is not." He moved then, crossing the space between them in two strides. Close enough she could see the rain still clinging to his eyelashes, smell the cedar and smoke that always clung to his clothes. "But I find I am no longer capable of being fair where you are concerned." "Three months." She held her ground. "You stayed away for three months." "I tried to stay away longer." "Why come back now?" "Because there is a contract on your head." He reached out, stopped just short of touching her face. "And I will burn down every corner of London's underworld before I let anyone collect on it."