Chapter 14 Shadows more when you're not looking
Lucy shut her apartment door behind her and pressed her forehead against it, exhaling slowly.
The silence felt too sharp.
Too empty after being surrounded by Lucas’s presence — that consuming, protective fire she didn’t want but couldn’t seem to step away from.
Get it together.
She peeled herself off the door and walked toward the bathroom to shower, to clear her mind, to pretend her heart wasn’t pounding for reasons that had nothing to do with fear.
But before she reached the bathroom, her phone buzzed.
Unknown number.
Her blood ran cold.
She let it ring twice more before answering.
“Hello?”
A woman’s voice. Young. Unsteady.
“Lucy?”
Lucy froze. “Who is this?”
“It’s—” a shaky breath “—S-Sarah. You saved me two months ago. At the docks.”
Lucy’s pulse kicked.
She remembered.
A terrified girl, barely seventeen, with bruises on her wrists and a broken sob when she realized she was free.
“Sarah?” Lucy said gently. “What’s wrong?”
“They found me,” Sarah whispered. “The Crowley men. I—I ran, I’m hiding, but—” her voice cracked “—I think they’re coming back.”
Lucy’s heart slammed into her ribs. “Where are you?”
“Near the old train yard on Fifth. Behind the fence—”
The line cut out.
“Sarah? Sarah!”
Nothing.
Lucy grabbed her shoes, barely tying them before she was out the door.
She hadn’t even processed she was moving until she was already sprinting down the stairwell, every protective instinct in her body roaring to life.
Outside, the morning sun had barely warmed the pavement. She flagged down the nearest rideshare — she didn’t have time to wait for a taxi — and jumped inside.
“Fifth Street train yard,” she said sharply.
The driver startled at her tone but nodded.
As the car sped through the city, Lucy’s mind raced.
Crowley hunters, moving again.
Taking back the girls who’d escaped.
Sending warnings to anyone who stood in their way.
This is why you don’t drag people in, she told herself.
This is why Lucas needs distance from you.
But her chest tightened.
Lucas had stayed outside her door all night.
Lucas had driven her home.
Lucas had looked at her like he’d tear down the world to keep her breathing.
No.
She couldn’t let him near this part of her life.
Not the blood.
Not the fear.
Not the broken girls who were counting on her alone.
The car screeched to a stop.
Lucy jumped out, running straight into the rusted, abandoned rail yard. The wind howled through the empty metal cars, carrying the faint sound of—
Crying.
“Sarah?” she called quietly.
A soft whimper answered.
Lucy followed it behind a fallen fence and broken concrete slab. Sarah sat curled up, shaking violently.
Lucy crouched beside her. “It’s okay. I’m here.”
Sarah launched into her arms. “They were waiting outside the shelter—I think they followed me—I didn’t know where else to go—”
“It’s okay,” Lucy murmured, brushing her hair back. “You’re safe.”
But then—
A crunch of gravel behind them.
Lucy spun around.
A man stood ten feet away.
Tall. Broad.
Crowley ink curling up his neck.
“Well,” he said, smiling slowly. “This is convenient.”
Lucy shoved Sarah behind her. Her pulse thundered.
She didn’t have a weapon.
She didn’t have backup.
“Step away from the girl,” he drawled.
“Not happening.”
He took one step.
Then another.
Lucy glanced around — rusted metal, broken glass, scattered debris — nothing she could use as a weapon.
The man reached into his jacket.
Lucy lunged, grabbing a fist-sized rock from the ground.
“Don’t,” she warned.
He smirked. “You’re fast, sweetheart. But not that fast.”
Her heart hammered.
She was alone.
Sarah was behind her, sobbing.
And the man drew a knife from his jacket.
Lucy tightened her grip on the rock—
A gun cocked behind her.
Both Lucy and the man froze.
A deep, furious voice thundered behind her:
“Touch her and you die.”
Lucy didn’t need to turn to know who it was.
Her entire body knew.
Lucas.
He stepped forward, gun leveled, jaw carved from stone, eyes blazing with lethal fire.
The Crowley man swallowed hard. “Bravata?
This isn’t your—”
Lucas fired a warning shot so close to the man’s foot the gravel exploded.
“Next one,” Lucas growled, “goes through your skull.”
The man ran.
Lucas didn’t move until he disappeared from sight.
Then—
He holstered the gun, turned to Lucy, and his control shattered.
“What the hell are you doing here alone?” he snapped, voice raw with fear and rage. “Are you trying to get yourself killed?”
Lucy opened her mouth, trembling, but he didn’t let her answer.
His hands came to her shoulders, gripping firmly, shaking with the adrenaline of almost losing her.
“Lucy,” he breathed, forehead nearly touching hers, “I told you I’d check on you. I told you I wouldn’t let anything happen to you.”
“I didn’t want you involved,” she whispered.
“Well, too damn late,” he growled.
“Because you are involved with me. Whether you want to be or not.”
His voice softened, dropping into something that made her heart flip painfully.
“I will always find you. Especially when you run straight into danger.”
Her breath hitched.
There, in the cold rail yard, with Sarah crying softly behind her and Lucas’s hands warm on her skin…
Lucy realized something terrifying:
She didn’t want him to walk away.
Not now.
Maybe not ever.