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100
Moore
Three days passed. And I'm in Lucien's bedroom for the first time.
No, we aren't fucking or anything. We're locked in.
Lillard finally came home, still recovering from his injuries. Relief flooded through me the moment I saw him, but it didn’t wash away the heavy weight sitting in my chest.
Because in those three days, Lucien and I had acted as if nothing had happened between us.
As if that kiss—the one that still burned on my lips—never existed.
We had fucked just once during those three days. The day Lillard returned. But it wasn't a cold one, it was as if Lucien wanted my body, not as a slave, but as his wife.
I kept expecting him to say something, to acknowledge it. But he didn’t. He carried on as usual, cold and distant, giving orders like the controlling man he was. And when he finally spoke to me directly, it wasn’t about the kiss—it was to tell me I wouldn’t be working at the hospital anymore.
"You’re done," he had said without room for argument. "You’re not going back."
I had wanted to fight him, to demand why he thought he could control my life like that, but a traitorous part of me was relieved. My emotions had been tangled for weeks now, and the hospital was just another place where I felt like I was suffocating under the weight of everything.
So, I didn’t argue. I just nodded, pretending it didn’t matter.
Still, I couldn’t ignore the way my chest tightened every time I was near Lucien. I was drawn to him, despite everything. Despite knowing I shouldn’t be.
And then, there was Grey.
Three of the men who had attempted to kidnap me had been apprehended, and their confessions made everything clear. Grey had ordered them to take me, to use me as leverage against Lucien.
I wasn’t surprised.
The evidence was overwhelming, and the police arrested him. But Grey had denied ever sending me threatening messages, claiming he only wanted to "scare me" into convincing Lucien to back off.
It didn’t matter. The damage was done.
Lucien crushed him completely, taking over his company in its entirety.
And just when I thought I might finally have a moment to breathe, Lucien’s parents arrived on the third day.
The moment they walked in, they noticed something was wrong.
The tension between Lucien and me must have been painfully obvious because, within an hour, his parents, along with his sister, decided to take matters into their own hands.
Which was how I found myself locked in Lucien’s bedroom with him.
“For the love of God, mother, open the damn door,” Lucien growled, banging on it.
“No,” his mother replied firmly from the other side. “You two are acting ridiculous, and we’re tired of it.”
“This is absurd,” he muttered under his breath, turning toward me.
I folded my arms. “You think I want to be in here with you?”
His eyes narrowed. “I don’t care what you want or think.”
I scoffed, walking toward the large window, refusing to acknowledge the sting in my chest. I wasn’t sure how much time passed. minutes, hours, but we sat in silence, neither of us willing to speak first.
Then his phone rang.
Lucien answered it, immediately diving into what sounded like a business conversation. His voice was tight, irritated.
“Then fix it,” he snapped at whoever was on the other end. “I’m not going to sit here while the entire campaign falls apart. This shouldn’t have happened in the first place.”
I listened for a while, slowly piecing together the problem. Then, against my better judgment, I spoke.
“You’re going about it the wrong way.”
How did I got that confidence? No idea.
Lucien’s head snapped toward me. His icy glare alone could have frozen me solid.
“Excuse me?”
I tilted my head. “You’re tackling the issue from a surface level. The problem isn’t the campaign itself. It’s the fact that your target audience doesn’t relate to it.”
Lucien's grip on his phone tightened. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
I let out a small laugh. “Really? And tell me, Lucien, did you ever bother to find out why my company thrived before I left it in Grey’s hands?”
That gave him pause.
I saw it—the flicker of hesitation. The slight shift in his gaze.
“If I hadn’t gone to prison,” I continued, “my company would have overtaken yours. And you know it.”
His jaw clenched. “You’re bluffing.”
I stepped closer. “Am I?”
Something changed in his expression, his cold demeanor cracking just slightly.
And then, just like that, we were arguing.
What started as a heated debate about business strategies turned into something much more intense. We were both stubborn, both unwilling to back down. The words grew sharper, louder, the tension between us crackling like electricity in the air.
For the first time since I met Lucien, I saw something different in him. Not just the cold, ruthless businessman, but someone competitive, someone who wasn’t used to being challenged.
And I was getting under his skin. Because if he was that cold man, I did be pinned somewhere by now for raising my voice at him.
I saw it in the way his brows furrowed, in the way his breathing quickened.
The argument became so intense that his parents finally unlocked the door, shaking their heads as they realized we weren’t going to learn anything from being locked up together.
Lucien’s mother sighed. “Well, that was a failure.”
His father chuckled. “At least they’re talking now.”
I didn’t wait for any more of their comments. I stormed out, heading straight to my room, my room, not Lucien’s.
For the first time, I had seen his bedroom.
It was different from mine. Cold.
The space was vast, pristine, empty. The colors were muted—gray, black, white. There were no personal touches, no warmth. It was a perfect reflection of him.
In contrast, my room felt… lived in. Even though it wasn’t really mine, I had made it into something softer, something that felt human.
I hated how much that said about Lucien.
\---
The suffocating feeling wouldn’t leave me.
So, I did the only thing I could think of—I left the house.
I grabbed one of the dresses Lucien had bought me, ignoring how his money was becoming a part of my life, and asked Damian to drive me to the beach.
Lillard was still healing, so the car ride was mostly silent.
When I got there, I wasn’t expecting to run into anyone familiar.
But then I saw Nicole.
Nicole was with Jordan. Both walking on the beach while laughing heartily.
Are they a couple?
“Moore?” Nicole’s eyes widened before she rushed forward, hugging me tightly.
I laughed, genuinely happy to see her. “I can’t believe this.”
“My goodness!” I laughed heartily, almost forgetting my moody state. “I thought I'd never see you again. And here you're with Mr Jordan. Are you two a thing?”
Nicole raised her brow and scoffed. “Me and him?” She waved her hand, “Jordan is my brother.”
“Ohh…” I muttered, staring at Jordan who joined in the laugh.
“You two know each other… I can guess where.” He chipped in jokenly.
Nicole had just returned to support her brother, Jordan, for his upcoming cooking show launch.
We spent the afternoon catching up. She was stunned when she found out I was married—to Lucien, of all people.
“So it was her wedding you told me you were going to?” She asked Jordan who shut her a warning glare.
I avoided the topic as much as possible.
Instead, I turned to Jordan. “Would you teach me how to cook?”
He raised an eyebrow but smiled. “You? Cook?”
I rolled my eyes. “Yes, me. Don’t act so surprised.”
He laughed. “Alright. But don’t say I didn’t warn you if you end up hating it.”
\---
When I got home, Lucien was waiting.
“You’re spending the night in my room.”
I blinked. “What?”
“My parents still think I hate you. This will convince them otherwise.”
I shrugged. “And why do you care what they think?”
He didn’t answer.
I freshened up, joining them for dinner. That’s when his sister made the whole dinner awkward immediately.
"Don't you think Moore looks just like her, Mum?"
Lucien froze. His entire body tensed, and his glare alone was enough to make his sister shrink back.
"Shut your mouth," he warned.
But I wasn’t about to let it go.
"Who's Felicity?" I asked, watching him closely. I could already guess who she was. The lady in the picture in the red room.
Lucien’s cold gaze turned to me.
"Moore." His voice was pure ice.
It was a warning.