I couldn’t hold back a smile. “Yeah, well, he didn’t.”
He sighed again. “Yeah, and I can hear just how gooey you are about the piece of shit. I damn well knew you’d fall for him. From the very moment you told me about him grabbing you at Tinsley’s ball, I knew you’d go crazy over the bastard.”
He wasn’t wrong on that score.
I nearly leapt out of my skin when my cell phone bleeped with a call waiting to come in. My fingers were shaking in an instant as I knew it was him. Lucian. It couldn’t be anyone else.
“Got to go,” I said to Tristan. “I’ll be in touch though.”
“Just don’t come back here!” he told me. “The Constantines and the Morellis are about to start a war, and they’ll take you out. Both families will take you out. I’ve had people from both sides asking me questions.”
I blustered out a fresh chunk of goodbyes and picked up the call from Lucian with a gasp.
“All good,” he said. “On my way back. Pack our things, get ready to go. Quickly.”
“Ready to go?” I asked. “Ready to go where?!”
“Wait and see,” he replied, and his voice had a dark tease about it.
It gave me shivers of a whole other kind than fear.
With that, he hung up, leaving me hanging.
Hearing he was on his way back was enough of a relief that I dropped down onto the bed, still staring at the screen in shock. I let myself have a minute to collect myself.
All good.
He was alive. Alive and well. Alive and safe.
Thank holy fuck for that.
Pack our things, get ready to go. Quickly.
A simple enough instruction.
I jumped to attention, scouting around the room to pile everything back into the suitcases. Toiletries, a few crappy clothes that needed washing…barely anything worth keeping. I looked around for his things at the same time, but his suitcases were already organized a damn sight better than mine were. He was a whole lot neater by nature.
He walked in the door twenty minutes later and I nearly bowled him over, I launched myself so hard at him.
It was another wail from me, an exclamation that boomed around the room.
“Lucian!”
I had my arms around him in a flash, like a limpet to his chest, pulling back just far enough to check out his expression. Stern. Disapproving. He was well and truly Lucian Morelli again.
He dropped me to the floor. “Are we all packed and ready to go?”
I nodded and pointed to the suitcases on the floor by the bed, feeling like a nervous little doll under the dark gaze of her monster. “Yeah, we’re ready to go.”
“Good, because we have a limo waiting outside.”
“A limo?”
He nodded and gestured to the window. I raced over and looked out at the street below and there it was. A sleek black limo parked and waiting.
I asked the obvious question. “Where are we going?”
He was already picking up the suitcases, still smiling when he met my eyes. “To Henley on Thames. A town on the outskirts of London.”
Henley on Thames sure sounded grand. I could feel the tingle of excitement at the idea of going anywhere with Lucian Morelli, but this was intense, because I could feel it in him, that excitement to match.
I wanted to ask him a million questions, but he didn’t give me the chance. He was too busy getting ready, checking the suitcases were fastened up securely before positioning them ready to go.
“Come on,” he said. “The less time we have to spend in this shithole, the better. I’m well and truly done with it.” His voice was laced with himself. With the Lucian Morelli I’d grown to adore.
I picked up the cruddy suitcase of my own and joined him at the door.
“Ready?” he asked again and I nodded.
“Yeah, I’m ready.”
“Good,” he said, holding the door open as I stepped through to the hotel landing.
I trotted along at his side, heading downstairs. He didn’t bother checking out. Didn’t even look at the reception desk as we walked by to the main entrance, just paced along as him, proud, tall and on a mission to get to where he was going.
Yep, there it was right outside the front doors. The limousine. It felt like a passport into the kind of world I truly thought I’d left behind.
“Farewell, fake fucking IDs,” Lucian growled and I followed him, stepping out into the evening chill.
The driver was suited and gave a little bow as he opened the limo doors for us. I slipped inside and Lucian followed me, pressing up close in the back seat and wrapping his arm around my shoulder as the driver loaded our suitcases into the trunk.
“Here we fucking go,” he said. “Say hello to the start of our whole new life.”
I felt starstruck as we pulled away, still trying to soak in the speed of the change around me. I stared back at the hotel as long as I could until it disappeared from view, feeling a strange attachment to it as we left it behind.
“Talk to me, then,” I said to him. “Where the hell are we going, in a limo, out of the blue? Where is this whole new life?”
He leaned back in his seat, still smirking. “We’re going where we belong, Elaine. To a glorious damn manor house in Henley on Thames.”
Even the thought of being in a manor house was weird. I laughed out loud as I raised my foot from the floorboard, showing him a battered sneaker. “Not sure I belong in a manor house looking like this.”
“Not yet,” he said. “But you will. I assure you, Miss Constantine, you will. You’ll be fitting in there just fine when we get you the wardrobe you belong in.”
He took my hand and pulled it onto his thigh, holding it firm as he kept on talking.
“My initial meeting with Quentin and Ellis went exceptionally well. We have many opportunities to discuss. Many.”
“That’s great,” I said. “So, we’re going to be safe here? We’re really going to be Lucian and Elaine living abroad? Do you think it will be far enough away?”
“Yes, we’re really going to be Lucian and Elaine living abroad. For right now we’re going to be Lucian and Elaine living at the Quentin Estate, on the outskirts of Henley on Thames, staying with our very prestigious associates, Devon and his lovely wife, Francesca.”
He made it sound like these people were supposed to be our very best friends or something, even though I knew he barely had any friends at all. He read my mind.
“It’s amazing how attractive friendship can become to people who want to do business with you,” he said. “Believe me, sweetheart, Devon Quentin most certainly wants to be our friend. He’s dedicated a whole wing to our stay.”
I had never heard of Devon Quentin or his wife, Francesca, but I could tell from Lucian’s tone that they were very important people. I felt weirdly self-conscious at the thought of meeting them with crappy clothes on and not a single scrap of makeup on my face.
“You’ve come up with a deal with him, then?” I pushed. “He wants to form an alliance?”
“Yes, indeed he wants to form an alliance. There are plenty of my assets and associations that he finds very attractive. They should partner up very well with his.” He paused. “And very well with some of his other connections’ assets too. As I said, we have many things to discuss.”