Page 23 of Ruined by My Ex’s Dad (Silver Fox Obsession #2)

Lucas

C HAPTER THIRTEEN - LUCAS

I'd spent twenty years controlling everything—my business, my feelings, every person in my life.

It was who I was.

Without control, I didn't exist.

That truth had never wavered until Savannah Blake.

As I stood in my penthouse foyer, staring at the door she'd just knocked on, I felt that control slip through my fingers like sand.

Four days since the hospital.

Four days of silence between us, broken only by her increasingly desperate texts that I'd left unanswered.

Four days of rage and desire warring within me, neither gaining clear victory.

I shouldn't have asked her to come.

Shouldn't have sent that text after midnight: My home. One hour. We need to talk.

Shouldn't have opened that door to the one vulnerability I couldn't afford.

But I had.

When I finally opened the door, she stood there in the dim hallway light, those green eyes wide with uncertainty.

She wore a simple green dress, modest yet clinging to her curves in ways that made my blood heat despite everything. Her hair was loose around her shoulders, the way I preferred it, and I hated that I noticed.

Hated that my body still responded to her as if she hadn't betrayed the fragile trust we'd been building.

"Come in," I said, my voice revealing nothing of the storm raging inside me.

She stepped past me, her familiar scent—jasmine with undertones of vanilla—wrapping around me like a memory.

I closed the door with deliberate precision, each movement calculated, controlled.

"Lucas," she began, turning to face me.

"Thank you for?—"

"Don't thank me yet," I interrupted, moving to the bar and pouring myself a scotch. I didn't offer her one.

"You have no idea why you're here."

Her shoulders straightened slightly, chin lifting in that subtle defiance I'd found compelling from our first meeting.

"Then tell me."

I took my time answering, swirling the amber liquid in my glass, studying her over its rim.

She looked exhausted—shadows beneath her eyes, a slight pallor to her normally vibrant complexion.

Good.

Let her suffer as I had these past four days, sleep evading me as I replayed her lie again and again, searching for meaning beneath the words.

"Why did you lie to me, Savannah?" I kept my voice even, curious rather than accusatory.

"Not about who called you. I understand panic, impulse. I mean the elaborate fiction you created afterward. The hospital contacts. The donor lists. The details you fabricated to make it plausible."

She flinched, her hand reaching for the back of the sofa as if needing support.

"I don't know," she whispered. "It just... kept growing. One lie building on another until I couldn't stop."

"That's not an answer." I set my glass down with precise control.

"You're too intelligent for mindless snowballing. You made deliberate choices with each word."

Her eyes flashed with momentary anger.

"What do you want me to say, Lucas? That I'm a pathological liar? That I've been manipulating you from the beginning? Because neither is true."

"What I want," I said, moving closer, "is the truth. Not more convenient fictions."

The space between us felt charged, dangerous in ways that had nothing to do with desire and everything to do with power—who held it, who surrendered it, who wielded it against whom.

"The truth," she repeated, a bitter smile playing at her lips.

"You want the truth? Fine. I lied because I'm caught between you and your son. Because acknowledging Miles's place in my life meant confronting the ethical disaster we've created. Because every time his name comes up between us, I see something dark in your eyes that terrifies me."

Her words hit with uncomfortable precision, targeting vulnerabilities I'd thought well-hidden.

The possessiveness I felt toward her was primitive, visceral, beneath the sophisticated exterior I presented to the world.

"And what did you see in my eyes at the hospital, Savannah?" I moved closer still, close enough to feel the heat radiating from her body.

"When I realized just how elaborate your deception had been?"

"Disappointment," she whispered, not backing away despite my deliberate invasion of her space.

"Betrayal. And something colder I couldn't name."

"Couldn't? Or wouldn't?"

Her eyes met mine, unflinching despite the tears gathering in their corners.

"Loss," she admitted finally. "I saw the moment you decided I wasn't worth the risk after all."

The accuracy of her assessment momentarily stole my prepared response. I had felt that—the cold calculation overriding desire, the mental ledger shifting from potential gain to likely loss.

The businessman's instinct to cut ties when an investment turned problematic.

But there had been something else she hadn't named, something I barely acknowledged even to myself: fear.

Fear that if she could lie so convincingly about something so trivial, what else might she conceal? Fear that the connection I'd felt with her—the recognition that had seemed so profound—was another fabrication.

Fear that I might be losing control not just of the situation, but of myself.

"Why are you here, Savannah?" I asked instead, refusing to confirm or deny her observation.

"After four days of silence, why come when I called?"

"You know why," she said softly.

"Tell me anyway." I needed to hear it, needed the admission as evidence that I still maintained some control over this unraveling situation.

"Because despite everything, despite knowing better, despite all the reasons this is destructive..." She swallowed hard, her composure finally cracking.

"I can't stay away from you. Can't stop wanting you. Can't pretend that what's between us is something I can simply walk away from."

Her vulnerability should have satisfied me, should have restored the equilibrium I sought.

Instead, it tore at something inside me—the part that recognized her admission as a mirror of my own unspoken truth. I had called her here despite my anger, my sense of betrayal, my logical assessment that continuing our involvement was a risk I couldn't afford.

Had called her because I, too, couldn't simply walk away.

"And Miles?" I asked, the name bitter on my tongue. "What's between you and him?"

"Nothing," she said immediately.

"You know that. He's a former relationship, a current professional connection. Nothing more."

"Yet you lie to protect him. To avoid 'complications' where he's concerned." I moved past her to the window, putting necessary distance between us.

"He still matters to you."

She made a frustrated sound. "Of course he matters. Not romantically, not sexually, but as a human being I share history with. As your son."

She followed me, her reflection appearing in the glass beside mine.

"Lucas, I lied to avoid having to navigate the minefield between you, not because I have feelings for Miles."

I wanted to believe her.

Wanted to accept the explanation that absolved her of deeper betrayal. But the businessman in me—the strategist who had built an empire on anticipating others' moves—couldn't dismiss the possibility that her motivation was more complex.

"I considered ending this," I said finally, turning to face her.

"Calculated the risk against the potential reward and found the equation unbalanced."

Pain flashed across her features, quickly masked but unmistakable. "I understand," she said, her voice steady despite the emotion in her eyes.

"I wouldn't blame you."

"I didn't say I reached that conclusion," I clarified.

"Only that I considered it."

Hope flickered in her expression, quickly tempered by wariness. She was learning—not to trust my words without examination, not to accept surface meanings without probing deeper.

"What conclusion did you reach?" she asked carefully.

Instead of answering, I closed the distance between us, one hand rising to cup her cheek.

She stiffened momentarily, then leaned into the touch with a small sound that seemed torn from her against her will.

"That I'm not finished with you yet," I said, the words emerging with an intensity I hadn't intended.

"That whatever this is between us—whatever madness, whatever recognition—it hasn't run its course."

Her pulse visibly quickened at the base of her throat, her pupils dilating as she registered my meaning.

"Lucas—"

I silenced her with a kiss—not gentle, not questioning, but demanding. Claiming. Her mouth opened beneath mine with a small gasp that sent heat coursing through me. My hands found her waist, pulling her against me with bruising force.

She responded instantly, arms winding around my neck, body molding to mine with the same desperate intensity. This wasn't the careful exploration of our first encounters but something rawer, darker—desire edged with anger, connection complicated by betrayal.

I walked her backward until she hit the wall, pinning her there with my body as my hands slid beneath her dress.

She was already wet, ready, her body honest even when her words had been false. I tore her underwear away with one sharp motion, the sound of fabric ripping loud in the quiet penthouse.

"Lucas," she gasped, half protest, half plea.

"Tell me to stop," I challenged, fingers finding her center, stroking with deliberate pressure. "Tell me this isn't what you came for."

She arched into my touch, hips bucking against my hand. "I can't," she admitted, voice breaking as I slid two fingers inside her.

"God help me, I can't."

The surrender in her voice fueled something primitive in me—the need to mark, to claim, to prove that whatever lies had passed between us, this connection remained real.

I lifted her, her legs wrapping around my waist as I carried her to the bedroom, never breaking the kiss, never relinquishing control.

I laid her on the bed, following her down, my greater weight pressing her into the mattress. My hands found the zipper of her dress, dragging it down with none of the careful reverence I'd shown in previous encounters.