Her breath caught. Alex had never particularly liked her full name. It sounded too grand. Too regal for a woman like her. A woman who didn’t know how to properly interact with anyone. A woman who preferred an empty office to a ballroom. A woman who was quite terrified of the emotions coursing inside her.
“Because,” she murmured.
“Because you think it is easier this way,” he offered.
She glanced down, which was answer enough.
He gave his head a slow shake and clicked his tongue. “But don’t you know how magnificent you are? How much we all wait for just a glimpse of you so that we might gain a bit of your attention.”
She let out a choked laugh that sounded more like a sob. “I think you are still concussed.”
He smiled at her then, that bright brilliant smile that lit up her entire body. “I very well may be, but that doesn’t mean I’m not also right.” Alex started to object, but he held a finger to her lips. “I’ve spent a week in this house interacting with every single person here except for you. And yet it is your name that is always on everyone’s lips. Your counsel, your knowledge that everyone seeks. I’ve seen enough to know thatyouare the steady, beating heart of this family. And much like the body, a family can’t function properly if its heart is missing.”
“Lucien—”
“It’s true,” he insisted. “Every word of it.”
As he brushed his thumb gently along the curve of her cheek, Alex was shocked to realize she wascrying.
“Sorry.” She pulled away and immediately wiped at her cheeks. “I don’t know why I…”
“You don’t need to apologize for that,” Lucien said as she trailed off. “For anything.”
“I absolutely should,” Alex insisted as she stepped back. “It’s my fault you were nearly killed.”
But Lucien immediately followed. He would give her no quarter. “Given that you weren’t the large man who pummeled me, I think your fault is misplaced.”
“But I—”
“No, Alex,” he interrupted. “I won’t let you take this on as well. You are already carrying far too much.” She very much wanted to challenge him on that, but then Lucien slid his hand around the nape of her neck and began to gently massage the muscles there. “See? You’re so tense.”
Alex’s head tilted back at his touch as warmth spread down her neck and over her shoulders.
“There. That’s it,” he murmured in approval.
It was shocking just howgoodthis felt. How easy it would be to sink into the feeling and forget everything, but she forced herself to stay focused. “Why… why did you come here?” she managed to ask after a moment.
“Isn’t it obvious?”
Alex slitted her eyes open at the amusement in his voice. “No.”
Lucien leaned in until his lips brushed the shell of her ear. “I came here to be properly ruined. By you.”
At some point Alex had pressed her palms to his chest and now her fingertips flexed against the firm muscle beneath.
“Lucien,” she said in a terrible attempt to sound disapproving. “You aren’t well.”
“Then how come I’ve never felt better than I do at this exact moment?”
She pulled back to meet his eyes. “Because in addition to being concussed, you are delusional.”
He grinned in response and Alex felt it all the way down to her toes. “Why don’t you let me worry about that and you focus on my deflowerment.”
Alex huffed a laugh but when she began to step back, Lucien’s hands clasped firmly around her waist. The heat of his palms immediately sank into her skin.
“Tell me you don’t want me and I’ll leave this room,” he said, leaning into the crook of her neck once more. “And never bother you again.”
Before Alex could even begin to formulate a response, her traitorous body pressed against his lean form.
