She drew the sheet up and settled in to think about the trip to the River of Lights. She could have started at the end of the trek, but for just a moment she contemplated the beginning and all those extraordinary sculptures, the music, the moving lights.
For some reason, her mind got stuck there and she couldn’t let go, but she wasn’t sure why.
When Lucian returned, however, her mind connected the dots. It was because of him, because she’d once thought of him only as a vampire and the world he lived in as monstrous. But that ride, including the level of organization, the Tunnel of Love nature of the experience, the absolute beauty, spoke of something she could relate to implicitly as a human.
Which meant that her views had been so wrong about Lucian’s world. Initially, because of Daniel, she’d landed in the filth-end of a culture that had the same spectrum as her human world, ranging from scum to saints, and she’d judged his world by her extremely limited experience.
“You look so serious, Claire. What’s going on?”
She shook her head and sipped once more. She felt absurdly vulnerable right now and took comfort in hiding behind the small black mug with a four-diamond pattern on the side.
“Just thinking about last night. It was last night, right? Or have I been out longer than that?”
“Just last night.”
“And we’re both healed.”
“Welcome to my world.” He fingered the double-chain at his neck.
He sat on his side of the bed this time, angled away from her slightly. She turned in his direction, finally allowing her thoughts to travel farther, to leave the ride itself and move into the separate, hidden cavern, what had happened there, what she’d learned.
“My friend is dead.”
He didn’t look at her. This time he sipped his coffee. Maybe they both needed to hide a little. So much had happened, so much grief.
Her throat constricted, but she didn’t want to cry, not now, not yet.
“I’m sorry about Zoey.”
“And I’m sorry about Marius.” She drew a deep breath. She’d been grieving Zoey’s absence from her life for two years, but her death would change things. The loss of all hope was a terrible thing.
“Hey.”
She shifted her gaze to Lucian.
“Would you like to go home now?”
Claire at first didn’t understand what he was saying to her. She shook her head. “Sorry?”
He looked away from her and licked his lips. “Your journey is over, isn’t it? Daniel finished things with you last night when he told you about your friend. You have closure now.”
But even as he spoke these words, Claire sensed a small ripple of his doubt vibrate through the chains. “What is it, Lucian? What are you not saying?”
He shot his gaze back to her. “You could feel that?”
She chuckled and touched the chain at her throat. “Of course. What’s going on?”
He looked away again. Glancing upward, his brow creased once more, he said, “I don’t know. I guess I’m questioning what Daniel said about Zoey. I don’t trust him on any level, especially not to tell you the truth.”
“You think she’s alive?”
He shrugged and shook his head. “I don’t know. Probably not. Forget I said anything. What would Daniel have to gain to tell you that Zoey died? Nothing. Sorry, this is just me never trusting my father. I want you to have closure.”
“Closure.” The word had no meaning—or maybe it was more apt than she wanted to admit: The door had closed, so it was, therefore, “closure.” She wished she could reach for a small piece of hope through Lucian’s doubt about his father’s statements, but Lucian was right: Daniel would have nothing to gain by killing off her hopes.
No, she needed to face the hard truth that Zoey was dead. “When you’re ready, Claire, I’ll take you home. Just say the word.”
She frowned as she met his gaze. “I won’t leave yet, Lucian, not until we’ve found the weapon.”
He seemed genuinely surprised. “No, you only needed to stay long enough to find out what happened to Zoey, and now that you have, you can go home, which is where I know you want to be. I can keep hunting for the weapon, or I can find some other means of trapping Daniel and ending his reign of terror.” He rose to his feet, mug in hand. “But you don’t need to stay. In fact, I wish you wouldn’t. I’m living with enough guilt as it is that you were hurt last night.”
Claire leaned back against the pillows once more. Lucian looked worried, and she could feel the level of his distress through the chains. “I survived just fine.”
“Yes. You did. But there’s no reason why you have to keep being thrown in harm’s way. You’ve helped me so much, but you’ve done enough. I think we should get your chain off and get you home.”
She could feel that he’d made his decision, and the truth was that without Zoey alive, she didn’t have a reason to stay. Not a real one. Just a powerful, absurd desire to stick close to a vampire.
She nodded. “You’re right. I should be going.” But her throat constricted all over again.
She looked anywhere but at Lucian. She didn’t want him to know exactly why she was feeling this way.
Her gaze fell on her iPhone. She picked it up. Setting her mug on the end table, she opened up the video from the hidden cavern and let it play.
The distraction helped the tightness in her throat to ease up, then the video caught her attention. “Lucian, look at this pattern on the stone floor in the cavern.”
He approached her side of the bed. She handed her phone to him while keeping the sheet pressed against her chest. She wished she at least had a shirt to put on.
As Lucian watched the video, he moved to a nearby chair, turned, and handed her a black T-shirt. One of his. He must have felt her need; the chains were amazing. And Lucian was thoughtful. The man really didn’t understand who he was.
She held the shirt in her hands, and since he’d once more turned away from her, maybe to give her a little privacy, she pressed it to her nose. The fabric held his smell, a deep, rich scent that she’d come to associate with him and especially with sex.
Her body trembled head-to-foot with a sudden, overwhelming wash of pure desire.
He whirled toward her and stared at her. “You sure you want to go there?” But he smiled.
She shook her head and held the shirt up. “You have a scent that gets to me every time, and it’s in your shirt. But thank you for this.”