AI Rory’s palm was still pressed to the third deadbolt, the metal cold through the thin fabric of her Golden Empress delivery hoodie, when the latch snicks free and she yanks the door open, already opening her mouth to tease Eva about forgetting her keys again. She’d spent the last two hours camped on Eva’s couch, sorting through scrolls of warding runes while Eva ran to get masala chai from the shop down the lane, and she’d half expected her friend to come fumbling up the stairs, arms loaded with snacks, unable to dig her keys out of her tote bag. But it wasn’t Eva standing on the landing.
The rain that had been lashing Brick Lane all evening blew in up the stairwell, carrying the sharp tang of lamb curry and rain-soaked brick, and Lucien Moreau was there, his tailored charcoal suit jacket spattered with raindrops, his usually immaculately slicked platinum blond hair fallen in a damp strand over his forehead. His ivory-handled cane was planted firm in the center of the threadbare stair runner, and his eyes—one honeyed amber, the other a deep, endless black, the mark of his half-demon heritage—locked onto hers, and her throat went tight. She hadn’t seen him in three months, not since the night he’d walked out of Silas’ bar, the night they’d almost kissed, the night he’d left her standing alone by the jukebox like she’d never meant anything at all.
“What the hell are you doing here?” She stepped back, crossing her arms over her chest, her shoulder-length black hair falling in a curtain over one eye to hide the shock she couldn’t keep out of her bright blue gaze. The tabby cat, Ptolemy, peeked around the stack of grimoires by the couch, his tail flicking, and he trotted to the door to rub against Lucien’s ankle, like he’d missed the man who’d snuck him scraps of chicken every time he’d visited Eva before.
Lucien’s jaw tightened, and he nodded past her into the flat. “Can I come in? It’s important. It’s about Evan.”
Her blood ran cold . Evan, her abusive ex, the one she’d fled Cardiff to escape, had been sniffing around London for weeks, but she’d thought he was still lingering in Birmingham, that Eva’s wards had kept him from picking up her trail. She stepped aside, jerking her head to let him in, and spun to relock all three deadbolts, the familiar clicks sounding louder than usual in the hush. When she turned back, Lucien was standing in the middle of the cramped flat, his eyes scanning the sea of books and research notes that covered every surface, the stack of printed-out text messages Evan had sent her sitting on the coffee table, and his cane tapped once, sharp, against the floorboards. He’d twisted the ivory handle just enough that Rory caught the glint of the thin blade concealed inside, the weapon he kept hidden for the fights he couldn’t talk his way out of.
“I saw him outside Shoreditch station an hour ago,” he said, his French lilt thicker than she remembered, like the stress of the day had pulled it to the surface. “He was asking a street vendor if he’d seen a girl matching your description, working at a Chinese restaurant on Whitechapel. I followed him to the edge of the lane, made sure he didn’t come any closer. Waited to make sure you were safe before I knocked.”
“Safe.” Rory laughed, sharp and bitter, and she kicked a stray scroll out of her way as she walked to the kitchenette to fill the kettle, her hands shaking. She’d spent three months replaying that last night in her head, wondering what she’d done wrong, why he’d left so suddenly , why he’d never called, never texted, never even sent a message through Eva to check she was alive. “That’s rich, coming from you. You haven’t cared if I was safe in three months. Why start now?”
Lucien turned to face her, his face tight. “That’s not fair, Rory. You know that’s not—”
“Fair?” She spun around, her hoodie swishing, and she jabbed a finger at his chest. “What’s not fair is you showing up here, dropping that bomb about Evan, acting like you’re my white knight. What’s not fair is that night at Silas’, when we fought about you wanting to ‘take care’ of Evan, when I told you I didn’t need anyone to save me, and we were inches apart, and I could feel your breath on my neck, and you pulled away. You just left. Walked out before I could even say another word, like I was another piece of information you could file away and forget. I spent weeks thinking I’d read something wrong, that I’d made up the tension between us, that you’d never wanted me at all. And now you show up here, playing hero?”
The amber in his eye flared, the black pupil of his other eye expanding until it swallowed most of the white, the demon in him surfacing at the rage in her voice. He stepped closer, and she didn’t back down, even when he loomed over her, 5’11” to her 5’6”, his presence filling the whole small kitchen. “I left because if I’d stayed, I would have kissed you. I would have taken you up to your flat above the bar, and I would have never let you leave, and that would have put a target on your back. The people I deal with, the ones from my father’s realm of Avaros, they hunt for weaknesses. They take the people you love to hurt you. I couldn’t let that happen. I couldn’t let Evan or anyone else hurt you, so I stayed away. I thought if I was gone, you’d be safe. That no one would think to use you against me.”
Rory’s throat ached, and she pulled the sleeve of her hoodie up her left wrist, showing him the small crescent scar she’d gotten when she’d fallen out of that oak tree in Cardiff when she was seven, the one from her childhood accident. “I got this scar running from bullies who thought I didn’t belong in their primary school. I fled Cardiff in the middle of the night with nothing but a backpack and my savings to get away from Evan. I work twelve hour shifts delivering dumplings to supernatural creeps who’d eat me alive if I wasn’t sharp enough to outrun them. I don’t need you to protect me, Luc. The worst thing that ever happened to me wasn’t Evan. It was you leaving. I thought I’d rather be alone than have someone treat me like I was too fragile to handle the truth, but I was wrong. I was miserable without you.”
Lucien’s face crumpled, and he lifted a hand to brush a strand of hair off her face, his thumb brushing the apple of her cheek. “I’m an idiot. I’ve been an idiot since the first time you brought me pork dumplings at two in the morning, when I tried to overtip you and you threatened to pour soy sauce in the blade of my cane. I’ve loved you since that night, Rory. I was just too scared to say it, too scared I’d ruin everything. I thought if I stayed away, you’d be okay. That you’d find someone normal, someone who didn’t have a demon father and a list of enemies longer than the Thames. But I couldn’t stay away when I heard Evan was here. I couldn’t let anything happen to you.”
The kettle screamed behind her, but Rory didn’t move, she just reached up to cup his face, her palm warm against his cheek, and he leaned into her touch, his eyes softening. “I don’t want normal. I want you. I’d rather burn the world down with you than live in it safe and alone. Don’t you get that?”
He pulled her closer, his arm wrapping around her waist, and he kissed her, the rain still lashing the window, the smell of curry seeping up from the shop below, Ptolemy meowing from the couch where he’d curled up on a stack of Eva’s research notes. It was messy, and it was overdue, and it was everything Rory had spent three months dreaming of, the hurt and the fear melting away into something soft, something real. When they pulled away, Lucien rested his forehead against hers, and he laughed, quiet, when Ptolemy trotted over to wind around his legs again. “Eva’s going to kill me for showing up unannounced, isn’t she?”
Rory grinned, turning to pour the hot water into two mugs, the tea bags steeping. “Only if you don’t share your secret stash of macarons with her. She’s been begging you to bring those by for months. And for the record? If you ever leave me like that again? I will dump soy sauce in your cane. I’m not kidding.”
Lucien leaned against the kitchen counter, twisting the handle of his cane to lock the blade back into place, his eyes warm as he watched her. “I won’t ever leave you again. I promise.”