Young Master Lucien’s Bride

Chapter Twelve

Lucien’s POV

Arthur told me about the flower incident the second I walked through the front door. He was standing in the foyer, his hands clasped precisely behind his back, looking at me with an expression that was just a little bit too smug for a butler.

"The yellow roses did not meet with her approval, sir," Arthur said, his voice entirely flat. "If I am being precise, Mrs. Knight carried the entire arrangement out to the balcony and dumped them directly into the rosebushes below. She also mentioned something about a divorce lawyer."

I let out a long, heavy sigh, rubbing the bridge of my nose as I walked past him. "Thanks for the update, Arthur."

Honestly, I should have known better than to send standard billionaire apology roses to a girl who had literally smacked my face the day before. Lila wasn't the kind of girl who could be bought off with an expensive delivery order, and she certainly wasn't going to swoon just because I filled her room with expensive plants. She was a fighter. I knew that about her, and yet I had still taken the easy, corporate way out.

I headed up the grand staircase, making my way toward my private wing to finally change out of my stifling tailored suit. The house was dead silent, the air heavy and still, but as I turned the corner into my personal corridor, I stopped dead in my tracks.

The heavy oak door to my private lounge was slightly cracked open.

I froze, my eyes narrowing as a faint, unmistakable smell of sweet vanilla perfume wafted out into the hallway. My heart did a sudden, violent thud against my ribs. There was only one person in this entire mansion who smelled like that.

I stepped inside completely silently, my leather shoes making zero sound against the thick Persian rug. The lounge was dim, shadowed by the evening light, but I could perfectly see the figure sitting in the center of the room.

Lila was completely curled up in my massive leather armchair. She looked tiny against the dark brown leather, her legs tucked up underneath her. But what made my breath catch in my throat was what she was wearing. She had somehow found her way into my private closet and stolen my old, faded college football jersey. The heavy fabric completely swallowed her frame, the sleeves falling way past her elbows and the hem reaching past her knees. She looked absolutely ridiculous, and completely beautiful.

She was entirely engrossed in what she was doing, her head bent low over a heavy, dust-covered book resting on her lap. I took another silent step closer, peeking over the back of the chair.

She was reading my middle school yearbook.

A sudden wave of pure panic and intense amusement hit me all at once. She was currently staring at a page from over a decade ago, her fingers tracing a very embarrassing, very glossy photo of a thirteen-year-old Lucien Knight.

Before I could say a word, Lila moved her head slightly, and her eyes caught my dark reflection in the glass cabinet across the room.

She jumped a mile into the air, a sharp gasp escaping her throat as the tennis ball of adrenaline hit her. The heavy yearbook nearly slipped from her lap, but she scrambled, catching it clumsily and instantly shoving the book behind her back like a guilty toddler caught with her hand in the cookie jar. She tried to scramble right out of the massive chair, her face turning a bright, instant shade of red.

"Lucien!" she squeaked, her voice cracking slightly as she tried to stand up straight. "You... you're supposed to be at a late-night board meeting!"

"The meeting ended early," I said, leaning my shoulder against the edge of the glass cabinet and crossing my arms over my chest.

I didn't even yell at her for breaking the number one rule of the house. I didn't remind her that this wing was completely forbidden, or threaten to call the guards, or put on the cold, ruthless CEO act. I just stared at her, my eyes drifting down to the massive jersey hanging off her shoulders, and then back up to her guilty, flushed face.

"So," I murmured, a tiny, genuine tug pulling at the corner of my lips. "Did you find anything juicy from my braces' era?"

Lila froze, her mouth opening and closing like a fish as she realized she had been completely caught. She blushed a furious, adorable shade of pink that crawled all the way from her cheeks down to her neck. Seeing that she couldn't hide it anymore, she violently pulled the heavy yearbook from behind her back and shoved the book hard into my chest.

"Shut up," she snapped, though there was no real venom in her voice this time. She crossed her arms tightly over the massive jersey, glaring up at me with a look that was more embarrassed than angry. "If you must know, your eighth-grade haircut was a literal crime against humanity. Who allowed you to walk around looking like a rejected member of a generic boyband? The public needs to know the truth about the ruthless Lucien Knight."

"It was a dark time for everyone," I admitted softly, holding the yearbook against my chest, over my pounding heart.

The silence that settled over the room wasn't heavy or suffocating like it usually was. It felt light, almost normal. It was the first time we had spoken to each other without her screaming at me, or crying, or giving me a look of absolute, burning hatred. The playful, sarcastic spark in her eyes made my chest physically ache with a sudden, sharp longing. I wanted so badly to just pull up a chair, sit down next to her, and talk to her like a normal guy. I wanted to tell her about how awful that eighth-grade year actually was, about how I used to hide in the library because I was too awkward to talk to anyone. I wanted her to see the person behind the wealth, behind the contract, behind the monster she thought I was.

But I couldn't. I had to keep my distance. I had to keep the walls up, because the moment I got emotional, the moment I let her see how vulnerable I actually was, would be the moment I failed to protect her. If she saw me as a man instead of a shield, she would start taking risks I couldn't afford to let her take.

Before I could ruin the rare, perfect moment by getting completely inside my own head, Lila cleared her throat loudly, breaking the spell.

She pointed a defensive, sharp finger down at the oversized football jersey she was wearing, her chin tilting up in that fierce, defiant way I loved so much.

"And before you start accusing me of being a thief," Lila muttered, looking away from my eyes as her cheeks flushed pink again. "I am keeping this jersey. I'm taking it back to my room."

"Is that so?" I asked, raising an eyebrow. "And why is that?"

"Because the thermostat in this entire mansion is permanently set to 'arctic tundra' levels," she complained, shivering slightly to prove her point as she pulled the heavy fabric tighter around herself. "I am freezing to death in that giant prison cell down the hall, and since you're a billionaire, you can certainly afford to lose one old shirt. Consider it a tax for trapping me here."

I stared at her for a long second, watching the way the dark blue fabric of the jersey made her pale skin look completely radiant. It was the jersey from my championship game, the one thing I had kept from a time before everything in my life went completely wrong, but seeing it on her felt entirely right.

"Keep it," I said softly, my voice rough. "The jersey looks better on you anyway."

Lila blinked, clearly caught off guard by my lack of an argument.

She opened her mouth to shoot back another sarcastic comment, but instead, she just let out a quiet huff, brushed past my shoulder, and marched out of the lounge, the oversized jersey swishing around her knees as she headed back to her side of the house.

I stood alone in the dim room, listening to the soft click of her bedroom door closing in the distance, and for the first time in years, the silence didn't feel completely empty.