Chapter 6

Warning: Slight Sexual Content.

Lucian spends the night with me.

I wasn’t expecting it.

I thought he would leave after whispering his promises, after kissing me like a secret. I thought he would walk away—just like always.

Instead, he stayed.

He took my hand and led me back to our room in silence. There was no hesitation in his touch, no guilt, no shame. Just familiarity. Muscle memory. He guided me to the bed we’d shared for years and laid me down like I still belonged there.

Then he undressed me—slowly, deliberately, as if mapping every inch of me back into his memory. His hands dragged along my sides, over the soft dip of my stomach, tracing the outline of my ribs with a gentleness that made me ache.

His mouth followed.

Kisses down my neck, my collarbone, my breasts. His lips closed around one nipple, tongue flicking, then sucking until I whimpered beneath him. He groaned against my skin, rolling the other between his fingers until both peaked for him.

I gasped—hips twitching, thighs parting.

Corneille was a storm in my chest, radiant and hungry, wild with the need to feel him again. There was no shame in it. No hesitation. Only instinct. Only heat.

Lucian kissed lower, his tongue dragging across the soft swell of my belly, then lower still. He settled between my thighs and looked up at me like I was his only prayer.

Then he made me forget.

His tongue slid against me, slow and maddening, before circling my clit with precision that made my back arch clean off the bed. He moaned as I gasped, as I writhed under the grip of his hands locking me in place. He devoured me—hungrily, relentlessly—like he needed to memorize the taste of me, like he couldn’t get enough. He didn’t stop when I came, didn’t stop when I trembled and begged, didn’t stop when I gasped for breath.

He stayed there, worshiping me with his mouth, dragging me over the edge again and again, until I could do nothing but shake and plead and fall apart.

It shouldn’t have been so easy.

Not after what he’s done. Not after everything he let happen.

But my body answered to him like it always has—like it always will. Moaning, clenching, coming undone beneath his touch, undone by every curl of his fingers, every groan against my skin.

When he finally slid into me, the stretch made me cry out. He shushed me gently, kissed my temple, then began to move—slow and deep, claiming every part of me like he still had the right.

And I let him.

Because tonight, I didn’t want distance. I didn’t want anger. I didn’t want to remember that I would lose him again.

I just wanted this.

His weight on me. His mouth on my throat. His hips driving into mine, again and again, until all I could feel was him.

I clung to him through it all, not because I needed him to stay—but because I wanted to feel everything before he disappeared.

And of course—

He disappears.

I wake to a cold bed and silence.

No warmth. No hand in mine. No kiss on my shoulder. Only the scent of him lingering on the sheets, and the ache between my legs reminding me what he took—and what I let him have.

I don’t cry.

I just lie there.

Staring at the ceiling.