Chapter 81 He is whaat??
Deborah stared at her phone for several minutes, still seated in the quiet office where Knight had left her, her heartbeat thudding with the leftover heaviness of the confrontation. The message on her screen didn’t glow brighter or dimmer, yet it felt heavier than anything she had carried all day.
\[Luther Cain: Can we meet?\]
Her fingers went cold instantly. She didn’t know whether she wanted to throw her phone across the room or clutch it closer to her chest. His name alone made something inside her twist, tightly, painfully, undeniably and yet the echo of Knight’s warning still rang through her mind, reminding her of the danger wrapped in Luther’s shadow. For a long moment she simply sat there, debating with herself, feeling torn between running away and finally facing everything she had been avoiding.
After several minutes, with a shaky inhale and her chest tightening in both fear and longing, she typed one simple word, 'Okay' and sent it before she could convince herself to delete it.
The car that picked her up was silent and tinted enough that even camera flashes wouldn’t catch the outline of her face. Luther opened the door for her without a word, his features unreadable, his movements calm but controlled, like he didn’t trust himself to get too close too quickly. Deborah slid into the passenger seat, keeping her hands folded on her lap, avoiding his eyes because she knew that if she looked at him too long, all her carefully built walls might crumble.
Throughout the entire drive, neither of them spoke. The silence between them wasn’t empty....it was thick with unspoken fears, unanswered questions, and a tension that felt like it could shatter glass. Deborah had no idea where he was taking her, and Luther didn’t offer any hints, simply driving with steady, quiet determination, his jaw set, his knuckles pale against the steering wheel whenever a memory passed through his thoughts.
By the time the car slowed down, she realized they were nowhere near the city, far from the flashing lights, far from the noise, far from anyone who recognized the name Valmere or Cain. They ended up at an open seaside cliff where the wind carried the scent of salt and distant waves crashed against jagged rocks below. It was peaceful, hidden, untouched, almost like a world where their surnames didn’t matter.
When Luther stepped out, he walked to her side and opened the door again, his eyes lingering on her face with an intensity she tried to pretend she didn’t feel. Deborah stepped out without saying a word, letting the cold wind brush against her skin and anchor her in place. She kept her gaze on the horizon, refusing to meet his eyes, afraid of what she might see there.
Luther cleared his throat softly, the sound barely audible over the waves. “How are you?” he asked, his voice lower than she remembered, rougher too, like he had rehearsed the question a hundred times but still didn’t know if he had the right to ask it. “Are you okay, Deborah? After everything that happened… I’ve been worried.”
Deborah didn’t answer, keeping her eyes on the sea, her breath unsteady as she tried to organize the chaos inside her chest. She didn’t know how to speak when she felt torn in so many directions. She didn’t know how to breathe when every inhale carried the memory of his hands, his voice, and the danger that followed him.
Luther waited, letting the silence stretch again, but this time there was desperation threading through it. “Please talk to me, baby,” he murmured, the endearment slipping out naturally, unconsciously, like it belonged to a part of him he couldn’t switch off no matter how hard he tried.
Deborah finally turned to him, her eyes glossy with exhaustion, anger, confusion, and something she refused to name. Her voice trembled when she spoke, but her words were sharp and clear. “Stop this, Luther… stop pretending,” she said, and the wind carried the weight of her pain into the air. “Forget about me now.”
Luther’s brows drew together, confusion and hurt flickering across his face. “Pretending?” he asked quietly. “What do you mean by pretending?”
Deborah’s voice cracked, but she forced the words out, each one filled with every wound she had been hiding. “Stop chasing me, Luther! You are engaged with Alaina, right? Why are you still following me? What are we even supposed to be? I told you to stay away from me, Luther. Please… I want peace. I don’t want to be involved in any more issues again. I don’t want to be dragged into chaos or danger or anything that will destroy what little stability I have left. I don’t want to get hurt again…” Her voice broke completely, and her shoulders shook slightly as she whispered, “Please… please stop this.”
Luther felt the ground beneath him shift, not with fear but with the realization of how deeply she had been hurting without him knowing. He stepped forward without hesitation and wrapped his arms around her, pulling her into his chest despite her stiff posture. She didn’t push him away, not immediately, not entirely because even in her fear, she was tired of pretending her heart wasn’t screaming for him too.
“Deborah,” he murmured against her hair, his voice low but steady, “who told you I’m engaged?”
Deborah froze.
Luther let out a soft, almost disbelieving laugh, one filled not with mockery, but with a kind of helpless relief that she could almost feel vibrating through his chest. “I’m not engaged,” he said, pulling back just enough to look into her eyes. “Alaina is....”
Deborah blinked, confused. “What…?”
Luther’s lips lifted into a faint, tired smile as he brushed a strand of hair off her cheek. “Alaina is my cousin.”
Her breath hitched, her mind stumbling for words, her whole world shifting in a direction she didn’t expect because if he wasn’t engaged… then everything she feared, everything she tried to run from, everything she told herself was impossible…
Was no longer impossible at all.