Page 41

Lucan

Lucan needs to protect his Vivienne. Because for the first time in his life, he feels something, something so profound and so deep it threatens to shatter the ground he stands upon.

Something so raw and so passionate, it makes it hard for him to breathe, and breathing seems hard when he isn’t thinking about her.

Because for the first time in his life, he wants to please someone, to live for someone, to laugh for someone…be with someone.

He can’t be without her. But he might end up without her if Zev remains in the picture. And he can’t afford to lose her.

Sacrifices need to be made.

He needs to get rid of his twin brother. And he’s ready to go to any length to suck all the strength from Zev and silence his voice for good.

Even if it means sitting in the quaint office of a shrink at 12 noon.

“Before we start, I need you to know that you are safe here.” The woman sitting across from him says, her voice calm and clinical as she stares with understanding at Lucan’s whitening knuckles.

Her name, according to what Lucan found online, is Sasha Lachowksi. She’s in her early thirties, has a Siberian husky named Pluto, and a cat called Paris.

No matter how hard the woman tries to make Lucan feel comfortable, he can’t help it. He has had his hands clasped tightly over his knees since he came in, looking around like there are dangers lurking in the shadows, waiting to leap out and attack the moment he relaxes.

“And you don’t have to talk yet, either.” She watches him attentively, a warm smile touching the corners of her lips as she scribbles something into her notepad. “Let’s just start with your name.”

Lucan raises a brow. “My name?”

Sasha Lachowksi nods gently. “I know I have your name on my notepad right now. And I have spoken to you over the phone for the past twenty-four hours. Still, I want to hear you say your name.”

Lucan exhales sharply, drumming his fingers on his thigh. “Lucan Raskovic.”

“Nice to meet you, Lucan,” she says with a smile that Lucan is starting to find irritating. He just wants to leave here already and go back to her.

“Before we start, I’m not really sure I believe in this,” he says. “I am here only because I’m desperate, ready to try out anything.”

“It’s okay.” She folds her hands on her notepad. “You don’t have to believe it yet.”

“God, what am I doing here?” Lucan murmurs under his breath, unease weaving into his bones as his eyes sweep across the pristine and clean office for the hundredth time.

Sasha tilts her head to the side. “Yes, Lucan, what are you doing here?”

Silence stretches across them at her question, the answer sitting heavily on his chest. He can’t seem to bring himself to utter the words, not to a strange woman at least.

“You can trust me, Lucan,” she persuades. “Tell me why you are here. That’s the only way I can help you.”

The silence stretches further between them. There is no way uttering the words sitting on his tongue won’t make him sound vulnerable. And he hates being vulnerable in front of strangers.

“I don’t want him to hurt her,” he says, his voice low as he takes in a shaky breath. “I don’t want him to touch her too...ever again.”

“Her?” Sasha leans forward in the chair she’s sitting on, her elbows propped on her lap as she flattens her intertwined fingers under her chin. “Is this her someone important to you? Do you care a lot about her?”

“If I don’t care, will I be sitting here?

” His tone raises higher than he intends, but softness settles in his eyes almost immediately, and he sighs heavily.

“She has met him. She doesn’t like him…hopefully.

I don’t know if she’s afraid of him or intrigued.

Either way, I don’t want them to ever meet again.

If she does…” His fingers tremble on his lap, and he clenches them shut to control it.

“You think you’ll lose her because of him?” she asks softly. “And you don’t want to lose her, right? Not to him, at least.”

“I feel like I could die.”

Lucan doesn’t know why he is unashamed as he says it, that too in front of a woman he is meeting for the first time. He searches the room, as if he will find a clue to why he’s telling a total stranger his darkest fear. Must be something she put in the air, he thinks.

“Zev is unpredictable,” he muses, his eyes settling on Sasha again.

“Is that his name?” she asks. “The other part of you?”

“How generous,” Lucan scoffs. “He is not the other part of me. He is in his own league. I am basically just his clean up crew.”

“How long have you been living with Zev ?”

“Too long.” His eyes drop to his trembling hand. “I can’t remember. Could be as far as the day I was born. But he was quiet most of the time. Was silent. Then all of a sudden, he was loud. Too, too loud.”

“When exactly did he start talking?” she asks and Lucan raises a questioning brow. “I mean, what significant event occurred right before you started hearing his voice?”

Lucan’s fingers fiddle with the ring on his thumb, a flood of memory overwhelming him. “Ma was gone, our house was gone, I was hungry, cold…” He takes a long pause. “...and all I had was little Aiko.”

Though Aiko is a rascal now, a lost cause who is no longer so little, his sister will always be little Aiko.

“Little Aiko?” Sasha asks, while the echo of her pen against her notepad rings in the air.

“What are you writing, by the way?” He raises a suspicious brow at her.

“Nothing that should alarm you, Lucan.” She smiles reassuringly. “I’m just documenting our session.”

Lucan nods, but he isn’t sure he is comfortable with her writing what he is saying. She said he was safe here, didn’t she? Isn’t documentation a bit implicative?

“Little Aiko,” she echoes. “Who is that?”

“My little sister.”

“Okay.” She nods, then scribbles again. “Can you tell me how old little Aiko was when your Ma left?”

“You can just call her Aiko.” His tone is clipped, a little tension in his jaws. Sasha seems to notice as a common look flashes in her sharp blue eyes that seem to soften around the edges.

“Sure, Aiko,” she corrects, the smile back on her lips. “How old was Aiko when your Ma left?”

“Seven months.”

Sasha waits a bit as if thinking of the next question to ask.

“So, Zev.” She scribbles down something again. “What do you think brings him out?”

“Fear, stress, anger?” His brows furrow in irritation. “He enjoys thriving on the things I normally don’t like.”

“Before you met her, have you ever wanted to get rid of Zev?” she asks.

“No.”

“What’s her name?”

“Vivienne.”

“So you are trying to get rid of Zev for Vivienne, correct?” She leans into her chair.

“I just want to protect her,” he confesses. I want to keep her to myself.

The image of Vivienne flashes before his eyes, and a feeling of yearning settles deep in his chest. He flips his wrist, glancing at his watch. It’s a quarter past twelve. He wonders what she’s up to now. He can’t wait to see her again. He can’t wait to hold her. He can’t wait to kiss her.

He can’t wait to do whatever she wants with her.

There is a gentle thud when the therapist settles her pen and her notepad down on the coffee table. Lucan’s attention returns reluctantly to her.

“What if I told you getting rid of Zev won’t solve anything yet?”

Lucan’s jaw works, irritation licking at his chest.

“If I can’t get rid of him, what’s the point of coming here?”

“To understand Zev,” she says calmly. “Only then can you control if he stays or goes. Just understand him first. Why he is there and what he wants.”

Lucan leans into the chair. “I’m not sure if I should really trust you.”

“You don’t have to,” she says. “Just keep showing up for your sessions.”

But Lucan isn’t sure if he wants to go on with these so-called sessions.

It all feels weird and daunting, and seems to be a long-term process.

He wants something immediately, a quick snap to silence and dominate Zev.

Time is running out. He can feel it. The next time he makes a mistake of losing control, Zev will take over. And he will never surrender again.

He needs to stop it before it happens. There has to be another way to get rid of Zev.

The moment Lucan pushes open his door, he catches it—her scent. It’s like a summer breeze tangled in a lavender field.

His pulse thrums, heat sparking in his chest.

She’s here.

Shutting the door behind him, he scans the room, eyes hungry, searching. The living room is empty, but the television hums with a Turkish TV series.

Then, his bedroom door creaks open and she steps out, her lips curling into a soft smile.

“Hey.” Her voice slides over him like silk. “You went out?”

“Yeah.” He walks further into the room, pulling his phone out of the pocket and tossing gently on the coffee table.

“Okay.” She steps closer, slow, the heat of her body wrapping around him before she even touches him. When her arms drape over his shoulders, fingertips playing at the nape of his neck, the heat inside him ignites.

“So, where did you go?” she asks, pressing into him, her breath brushing against his.

His cock hardens instantly. And it sounds ridiculous but it’s like something happened inside him the moment he had sex with her yesterday.

Now he has become a man of little restraint around her.

It’s as if his cock has put a mark on her, recognized her scent, her sultry voice.

Maybe this is normal and he’s just inexperienced because he was a virgin just until yesterday.

Maybe that’s how it happens. Maybe Zev experiences it too when he has sex with another blonde at their clubhouse.

Now just a glance of her, a memory of her eyes while he was buried deep inside her, the sounds she made as she unraveled beneath him yesterday, has him breaking apart.

“Somewhere.” He shrugs, his nose grazing hers.

Her brow arches. “You don’t wanna tell me?” Then a mischievous glint flashes through her pretty eyes. “It’s a woman isn’t it? I know it’s a woman. Her scent is all over you, soldier.”