Chapter 137 137. Fuck You, Rafael
I waited for her to take it back, to tell me she was just overwhelmed, but she didn't. Instead, Camila did something that hurt worse than a scream.
She smiled.
Even as tears tracked down my face, even as my chest felt like it was caving in, she stood there with that gentle, sad smile that made everything worse.
"Stop it," I choked out. "Stop smiling at me like that."
But she didn't stop. She just kept looking at me with those green eyes full of love and conviction, and it made the tears well faster.
When last did I cry like this? Ten years? Fifteen? But here I was, falling apart in a police interrogation room because the woman I loved was choosing prison over me.
"How am I supposed to be fine, Camila? How am I supposed to face a world that doesn't have you in it? Am I supposed to go back to the penthouse and sleep in a bed that smells like you while you're spending the night on a cot in a cramped cell?"
She stepped closer, but I backed away, my heart hammering against my ribs.
"Is this the plan? I'm supposed to eat while I know you're sitting there with some plastic tray? I'm supposed to just accept this? God, Camila, please stop smiling at me like this is some noble sacrifice."
Her hand moved through the air, until her palm settled against my cheek. The contact was a searing heat that made my insides coil. She used her thumb to swipe away a fallen tear, her touch as gentle as if we were still back in Vienna.
"I have to do this, Lucien," she whispered. "I need to be clean. I need to know that when I stand beside you, no one can ever pull a string and make me disappear again."
"I'm sorry, but I don't agree with you. I don't care about clean," I snapped, though I didn't pull away from her touch. "I care about you being safe. You can hate me for this. You can scream at me, curse me, whatever you need to do. But you are not going to prison. Not for one night. Not for one hour."
I reached up, gripping her wrist and firmly removing her hand from my face. The loss of her warmth felt like a limb being severed. I couldn't look at her anymore-not when she was destroying us for some misguided sense of justice.
My vision was blurred, my throat tight, as I stormed towards the door.
"Lucien... please don't go..."
My hand froze on the door handle, and everything in me screamed to go back to her. To hold her. To tell her we'd figure this out together. But the rage and hurt were too much. She was choosing this. She was choosing to leave me.
So I left first.
I pushed through the door, past Rosalind who tried to stop me, past Damon who looked at me with wide eyes, past eavesdropping officers. I didn't stop until the cold New York air hit my face like a slap.
"Get out," I barked at the driver of the SUV-same SUV that should have taken us to her penthouse, and not me to the police station-and climbed into the driver's seat, slamming the door so hard the glass rattled.
My fist connected with the steering wheel once, twice, three times. The horn blared with each impact. A guttural scream tore from somewhere deep in my chest.
"Fuck! Fuck, fuck, fuck!"
Whoever leaked that video was dead. I would find them and drag them straight to hell. I would make them wish they'd never been born.
But who?
We had scrubbed the servers. The only people with access to the final review were in my inner circle.
What if... what if Rafael wanted her gone? What if he'd secretly hated her this whole time and finally decided to do something about it?
Rafael had access to everything. I have been pouring my energy into Camila and planning a life away from the company. We were even discussing shutting down the fintech app.
Had he seen her as a distraction? Did he think removing her would bring the old, ruthless Lucien back because that was who he secretly wanted?
I grabbed my phone and dialed his number, my hands shaking with rage.
"Lucien? I'm at the airport, I just-"
"Did you do it?" I roared, pulling the SUV out into traffic with a screech of tires. "Did you leak the footage, Rafael? Did you decide she was a problem that needed to be solved?"
"What the fuck is wrong with you?" Rafael's voice came back sharp and defensive.
"You heard me! You had a problem with Camila from the start. You said she was a distraction. You fought me on every decision I made about her!"
"Are you out of your fucking mind?" Rafael's voice rose to match mine. "You think I would betray you like that? You think I would hurt Camila?"
"I don't know what to think anymore!"
"Lucien Hayes, you better take that back right now," Maya added, just as furious as Rafael. "Rafael has been nothing but loyal to you. He loves Camila like a sister. How dare you accuse him of something like this!"
"Then who was it? Who else could have gotten that footage?"
"I don't know!" Rafael shot back. "But it wasn't me, and it sure as hell wasn't Maya. We've been in Vienna with you, remember? Or did that slip your mind while you were busy losing your shit?"
"Don't talk to me like that-"
"I'll talk to you however I want when you're accusing me of ruining the life of someone I care about! You're spiraling, Lucien. You're lashing out at everyone because you can't control this situation. But that doesn't give you the right to turn on the people who actually love you."
"She's going to prison!" The words ripped out of me. "She confessed. She's going to spend God knows how long locked in a cell, and you want me to stay calm?"
"Yes! Because Camila needs you to be strong right now, not falling apart and blaming your friends for something they didn't do."
"Fuck you, Rafael."
"No, fuck you, Lucien. Call me back when you remember who your real enemies are."
I slammed the end button before they could say another word and placed a call to Jonathan Weiss. Camila wanted Rosalind, but Rosalind was too ethical for what I needed now.
"Weiss, I need you on this case. Make it go away."
"Lucien, the confession makes this very difficult. Bail is already impossible, but it is possible for her to get a very small sentence. A year, maybe eighteen months."
"A year?" I sped past a taxi. "She isn't spending a second in a facility, Weiss. Fix it. Bribe someone, kill someone, find a fuckin' loophole, I don't care!"
"You need to calm down. I'm trying to be realistic, Lucien."
I hung up on him too. My mind raced.
Maybe it was Nadia. She'd betrayed Ronan, but what if she'd kept copies for insurance? What if she was playing a longer game than we thought?
'If she was the one,' I cracked my neck, 'I would put her six feet under.'
I reached the penthouse and ran straight to my home office. I flipped open my laptop, my fingers hovering over the keys, when I noticed a new message notification.
It was exactly who I was about to text. My guy from Morocco. I hadn't used him in months, and he never in our years of partnership, initiated contact first.
My brows pulled together as I clicked the message. I expected a friendly update or something, instead, my heart stopped.
"I told you you'll regret it, Lucien Hayes, didn't I?"