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“What are you doing?”

“Giving your friends the slip,” I said, and I hurried toward the end of the block and made a quick left.

By the time the men who came around the corner trying to find us made the same turn I had made, we were gone, blended into the crowd; vanished.

“They’re going to find us,” Lucien said as we walked hurriedly away from the hotel.

“I know,” I said, “But you’re taking me out to eat first.”

“I am?”

“Yes. Right now.”

Chapter

Nineteen

For the first time in what felt like a lifetime, Lucien and I were alone… despite being surrounded by people. We were in a restaurant, a busy place somewhere in Beacon Hill. I wasn’t exactly sure where, since I didn’t really know my way around the city, but I figured Diaboli’s men would find us eventually. For now, Lucien and I could finally just talk.

Talk without fear of listening devices.

Talk without fear of his father.

Talk without fear of anyone knowing the truth about us.

“I can’t believe we haven’t even had a chance to hash it out properly yet,” I said.

Though Lucien was sitting across from me at a small table in the back of the restaurant, his eyes were miles away. He seemed to be unable to stop himself from looking at the door, checking for his father’s men.

“Hash what out?” he asked, giving me his attention, if only for a moment.

“Would you stop worrying? If they show up, they show up.”

“Right…” he nodded. “What haven’t we hashed out yet?”

“That we knew each other before we met.”

“I’m surprised you’ve been able to keep it a secret.”

“I’ve been locked in a room for days on end, mostly left to my own devices. You’re the one constantly under your father’s eye. If anyone should be surprised, it should be me.”

“You thought I would crack?”

I paused. “I thought you would just tell him, if I’m being totally honest.”

He frowned. “Why would I do that?”

“The same reason you gave him my amulet.”

“I would never have given him that amulet if I had known what he was going to do with it.”

I shook my head. “I believe you, okay? I really do. We don’t need to get into that whole conversation. The more distance I can put between myself and it the better. I only meant that, what are the odds you would turn out to be… you… and I would turn out to be me?”

Lucien’s eyes darkened. “Do you think I did this on purpose? Somehow set events up to unfold the way that they have?”

“Did you?”

“I didn’t have a clue who you were, what your last name was, or that you… were like me. I only knew that you, out of everyone in that club, were the one who set my skin alight. You were the one who ignited this… this thing inside of me.”