The night swallowed the horizon whole as the black Lamborghini tore down the empty road, its engine growling like an animal that hadn't yet been fed its kill. Seraphine sat in the passenger seat, hair whipping lightly in the breeze that filtered through the half-open window. Her eyes kept darting to the rear-view mirror—not because she was checking for tails, but because every time she saw the attached baby chair in the back seat, it made her chest tighten.
Daniel wasn't with them.
Lucien's hands were tight on the wheel, the knuckles pale against the black leather. Not a word escaped his lips. Asher sat in the back, his shirt spotted with grime from the chaos they'd just left, his jaw working as if he wanted to speak but couldn't bring himself to. Every few minutes, the tension in the car rose another degree.
When they finally crested the long slope that led back to Lucien's estate, Seraphine felt her stomach lurch. It wasn't the adrenaline this time—it was what she saw.
The mansion that once gleamed with glass and marble stood in ruins.
The front gates were hanging loose from their hinges. The tall, elegant windows were smashed in, jagged teeth of glass catching the moonlight. Smoke still curled faintly from somewhere deeper inside the property. It looked worse than the state Asher's mansion had been left in after the last attack—this was destruction with intent, not chaos. Whoever had done this hadn't just come to damage. They'd come to humiliate.
Lucien's jaw tightened as the headlights washed over the debris. No guards were present. No servants. Just silence—the kind that felt wrong in a place that was usually alive with motion.
"Home sweet home," Asher muttered darkly, leaning forward between the seats. "Or, you know… sweet pile of ash."
Seraphine shot him a sharp look, but it lacked real heat. They all knew if they didn't keep up their dark humour, they'd drown in the weight of what just happened.
They didn't bother going inside. The air stank faintly of scorched wood and melted wiring. Lucien stared for a long moment before finally turning the car away from the property.
They ended up somewhere no one would expect them—an abandoned garden a few miles from the main road. It wasn't eerie or rotten. In fact, it was painfully beautiful: thick grass soft underfoot, moonlight spilling across rows of overgrown roses and lilies that had somehow survived without care. Marble statues, chipped but elegant, stood half-hidden among wildflowers. The air was cool, touched by the faint scent of jasmine drifting from somewhere unseen.
They parked the car beneath a willow tree, its curtain of branches giving them a semblance of privacy.
"This is where we hide now?" Asher asked, leaning back against the seat with a humourless smirk. "From glass walls and chandeliers to… nature."
"It's temporary," Lucien said flatly.
"It's poetic," Seraphine murmured, her eyes tracing the moonlit petals of a wild rose near the car window. "A beautiful place when our lives look anything but."
They sat in silence for a while, the soft rustle of the breeze in the leaves filling the space where conversation might have been. But the quiet didn't feel peaceful. It felt… suspended.
Asher broke it first. "We could go to my place."
"No," Lucien and Seraphine said at the same time.
"Okay, damn," Asher said, raising his hands. "But in case you forgot, my house is built and fully staffed. Big beds, running water—"
"They know where your mansion is," Lucien interrupted. "And they'll be watching it. We show up there, we're walking into a trap."
Asher leaned his head back against the seat. "Well, excuse me for trying to upgrade us from camping in a car."
"Even if they weren't watching," Seraphine added gently, "you have guards there now—too many for them to take on without casualties. We'd be putting your staff at risk."
"Ugh, fine," Asher groaned, rubbing his face. "Guess I'll get used to smelling like grass and desperation."
The real problem wasn't the location—it was the fact that neither Lucien nor Asher had cash on them. Black cards? Sure. But swiping them anywhere now would be like firing a flare into the sky to say, Here we are. Come kill us. Hotels were out of the question.
So, they stayed.
The night deepened, and the temperature dropped. They decided to sleep in the car, but only two of them actually got any rest. Lucien sat in the driver's seat; eyes fixed on nothing in particular. His hands were bound tightly with rope—a precaution Asher and Seraphine had insisted on after the way he'd nearly broken during the last attack.
"Don't take it personal," Asher had said when tying him up earlier. "You're the type who'd run into enemy fire if you thought it might solve things."
Now, the rope bit into Lucien's skin as his fingers twitched. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw Daniel's face—crying, terrified. He imagined what might be happening to him right now, and the thought alone felt like acid burning through his chest.
He thought about the times he'd promised Seraphine nothing would touch her or the child. He thought about how easily those promises had shattered.
An hour passed. Then two. Then three.
Somewhere in the fourth hour of stillness, something sparked in his mind.
It started small—just a fragment of memory, a mechanical whir, the faint reflection of steel in dim studio light. Then it grew. Connections formed. Pieces clicked. The ropes around his hands felt looser—not because they were, but because for the first time since Daniel had been taken, Lucien felt control return to him.
His lips curled into the faintest smirk.
He leaned over, his voice sharp but low. "Wake up. Both of you."
Asher groaned from the back. "It better not be because you saw a squirrel or something."
"Wake up," Lucien repeated, his tone leaving no room for argument.
Seraphine stirred, rubbing her eyes. "What is it?"
"I have a plan."
Her eyes widened, but before she could speak, he cut her off with, "And it's going to work. I need both of you ready to move now."
The car filled with a sudden buzz of tension—like the air before a storm. Even Asher sat up straight, his earlier exhaustion gone.
"What's the plan?" he asked.
Lucien's smirk deepened, but he didn't answer. Seraphine rolled her eyes at him, but those harsh eyes soon dissolved into extreme happiness.
"You'll see," he said, starting the engine.
And with that, the Lamborghini roared to life, rolling out from under the willow's shadow into the moonlit road, leaving the wild roses swaying silently in their wake.