Page 8 of Final Cost

Long pause.

Lucien clears his throat. “I don’t think you understand. The paps aren’t going away now that they’ve found you. More of them will come. You’re under siege. Do you really think Mrs. Hooper and her fancy neighbors want you destroying the peace of their quiet Upper East Side street?”

Oh, shit.

My heart sinks because I hadn’t thought of that. Mrs. Hooper is moving soon. She needs to stage the house and get it listed. She doesn’t need commotion right now. “It’ll die down.”

A disapproving rumble from Lucien. “You’re deluded. You’re not used to this kind of thing, but the press will be all over the story for the duration. That’s why you need to come back to Ackerley where I can keep you safe and we can figure out what our press strategy is going to be. And our legal strategy.”

Oh, God.

I’m just a nurse. Just a newly minted and lowly RN. I barely have a big girl credit card. How have I landed myself in this kind of mess? Even so, I can’t go back there. I love him too much. He affects me too profoundly. Even now, my racing heart is headed toward cardiac arrest territory, and he’s not even in the same room as me. Going back there will ruin the little bit of me that’s left. “No, thanks. Last time I was at Ackerley, someone tried to kill me. I feel safer on the mean streets of Manhattan.”

The funniest thing happens then. Lucien laughs. The sound is hard and bitter. Unexpected. But it plucks on some strings inside me that only he can reach. “You’re nothing if not predictable, Ms. Scott,” he says, his laughter fading away. “I knew you would say that. And you probably know that I’m going to saythis.”

I hold my breath and wait while dread tiptoes its prickly feet up my nape and across my scalp.

“We can do this the easy way or the hard way, Ms. Scott.” Lucien’s voice is full of silky menace. “If you’re not here by the end of the day, our next interaction will be me landing my helicopter on the roof of Mrs. Hooper’s brownstone and extracting you like a Seal Team Six operative.”

Oh, God. He’d do it, too. Worse, he’d probably bark a command at my rescuers here and seamlessly use their undying loyalty to execute a kidnapping. They’re all ex-military, as I recall. They’ve got the training. Hell, there’s nothing to stop them from doing it now if he snapped his fingers and gave the signal. Guys like this get things done. Guys like this probably have the skill set to take care of Ravenna for him. So what do I thinkI’mgoing to do? Fold my arms, stamp my foot and glare hard enough for them to let me go? Hop out of the speeding car, run away and go into hiding for the foreseeable future? Yeah, no. And I don’t want to test the full might of Lucien’s power. Still, I’m not going to just roll over and do what Lucien tells me to do because he told me to do it.

“You’re threatening me now?” I say.

“Absolutely, Ms. Scott. I hope I’m making myself clear about what I’m prepared to do to get you back.” He pauses and clears his throat. Maybe he heard the same funny note in his voice that I just did. “At Ackerley, I mean.”

I’ve had enough. “Listen, Lucien, I don’t know who you think you are, but you?—”

He hangs up on me and my mushrooming outrage, robbing me of the opportunity to get in the last word and tell him to go fuck himself, which is what I’d planned to do.

4

Lucien

Early that afternoon,I convene in my study with my younger brother, Roman, and my new criminal defense attorney, Grayson Stanwyck, thesonof Stanwyck & Son law firm. His father was a great friend of my father and handled most of my family’s legal affairs. Still does. Gray, here, is an old school friend of mine and Roman’s who went into the criminal side of his father’s firm. We see each other at the club or the gym. We play polo together. I never thought I’d need him to save me from jail.

Times change.

It’s already been a long day and the afternoon has barely begun. I don’t have much more juice available to defend myself to these two. Who knew Gray was such a pit bull on the job? I’d much prefer a genteel discussion with his old man to this ongoing interrogation and their disapproving faces.

“You shouldn’t have talked to the police is all I’m saying, Lucien,” Gray says for roughly the tenth time. “That’s basic. I don’t understand what you were thinking. That’s what you pay the firm for. To run this kind of interference for you. Now you’re tied to the version of events you gave them.”

I scowl. “I wanted to know what happened to Ravenna. They wanted to know my whereabouts. I told them the truth and we exchanged information. End of story.”

Gray barks out an incredulous laugh. “Thetruth? You’ve locked yourself into a timeline. And we don’t even know what time Ravenna died. You’re tying my hands here. I haven’t even had a chance to get started.”

I slump back in my desk chair and swivel so I can keep an eye out the window and on the driveway. Where there is a great but depressing view of the burned-out guest cottage but currently no sign of Tamsyn’s arrival. Even though I’d vehemently hoped she’d be here by now.

I’m hit with the sudden urge to drive my fist through said glass. Luckily, the thought of wasting the rest of the day in the ER getting stitches forces me to get my shit together. But it doesn’t make me any less eager to see Tamsyn again.

Shrugging irritably, I yank my attention away from the scene outside and try to focus on Gray. Roman, who’s sitting at the far end of the sofa and looking at me as though I’ve started using crayons to sign all my important documents, I ignore. “What do you want me to say?”

“Start with saying you’ll never do it again,” Gray says.

With that, I hit the limit of my patience. “It’s over,” I snap. “I did it. I shouldn’t have. It won’t happen again. Let’s move on.”

Gray looks flinty and skeptical, but thankfully lets it drop. “Great. Appreciate it.”

“Shifting gears, I think we should expect the police to?—”

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