LUCIEN: A Standalone Romance (18 page)

Adrienne

I dialed the phone again, but again it went straight to voicemail.

“Your dad?” Rachel asked.

“No. Lucien. He’s not answering his phone.”

Rachel reached over and took the phone from me.

“That’s unusual. He knows how worried everyone gets when he doesn’t answer the phone. Once mom drove four hours to his college dorms because he didn’t pick up. She thought he was in a coma on the floor or something.”

I glanced at her as she dialed the phone again. When she got the same response I’d gotten, she frowned, staring at the phone like it would tell her why he wasn’t answering.

“We should go by his house.”

“He’s probably out looking for me,” I said.

“Yeah. But it’s possible he forgot to eat or something because he’s worried.”

“Isn’t he supposed to be meeting your partners at the bed and breakfast?”

“Yeah. In about five minutes.”

“That’s probably why he’s not answering.”

Rachel made a funny little movement with her head. “Maybe.”

I glanced at her. “You’re starting to scare me.”

“I should call my mom. Have her go check on him.”

I gripped the steering wheel, remembering that moment when he went low, the way he’d looked at me when he asked for a box of juice. Was it possible he went low and no one was there? If his concern for me caused him to get really sick, I would never forgive myself.

“We’re going right past the turn off for his house. We could stop really quick—”

“That’s probably a good idea.”

“Does this happen often? Does he go low a lot?”

“No,” Rachel said, rubbing the phone against her thigh. “Not anymore. It used to, back when he had to take shots all the time. But I don’t think it really happens much now that he has the pump and the CGM thingy.”

“That’s good.”

“You really like him, don’t you?”

I flipped on the turn signal and gripped the steering wheel again, chewing on my bottom lip as I considered her question.

“Yeah,” I said slowly. “I think I do.”

“I know he likes you. The way he looked at you over the weekend… He’s never looked at anyone quite like that. Not even Kelly.”

“Kelly?”

“She was the girl he dated all through college. Everyone thought they were going to get married, but then she broke up with him when she started dating his roommate.”

“Oh, ouch.”

“Yeah. She was a bitch.”

I laughed. “You didn’t like her?”

Rachel groaned. “She was so mean to Lucien all the time. She’d tell him what to do and how to do it, like he didn’t have a mind of his own.”

I maneuvered the van off the interstate and headed down the side streets that led to Lucien’s house.

“How long did they date?”

“Two and a half years, I think.”

“Why did he stick it out so long?”

Rachel turned in her seat a little. “I don’t know. He liked her.”

“I dated a guy once who thought he was a god or something. He used to tell me how great he was all the time. It was so annoying. But I stayed with him because it was easier than going back to dating, you know?”

Rachel nodded. “I’ve done that, too. This guy, he was an asshole. But I had this dance coming up at school and didn’t want to go alone.”

“I guess we’ve all done stupid things when it comes to relationships.”

“At least Lucien’s already gotten it out of his system. Now you don’t have to worry that he might be going through something stupid with you.”

I smiled even as I turned into the short drive that ended in the guard shack outside Lucien’s housing community.

“That is a relief.”

The security guard came to the window and smiled when he saw us.

“Ladies,” he said. “How are you tonight?”

“Is Lucien up at his house?” Rachel asked instead of answering.

“He is,” the security guard said. “Is he expecting you?”

“No,” I said. “But he’s not answering his phone.”

“He was there with his brother about half an hour ago. Mr. Callahan left a few minutes ago.”

I glanced at Rachel. “He’s probably all right then. Maybe we should go on to Katy.”

“What are we going to do there? Your dad’s there. He can deal with it.”

I felt like I should be in Katy. I knew my father could handle whatever happened there, but I felt like I should be there because this was my case. I’d been working on it since the beginning. But a part of me just really wanted to see Lucien.

And wanted to know why Lucien wasn’t in Katy trying to save me from kidnappers. Wasn’t that what the text told him to do? Was there a reason why he wasn’t there?

Something was wrong. I felt it in my bones as I sat there with all these thoughts rushing through my mind. He should be in Katy. He would be in Katy if he could be. There had to be a good reason why he wasn’t there.

“Do you ladies want to go through?” the security guard asked.

Rachel just looked at me, leaving the decision in my hands.

“Yes.”

“No problem.”

He stepped back and reached into the guard house to push the button that released the gate. I drove forward slowly, narrowly missing the gate on one side. The guard was waving when I glanced in the rearview like we were old friends or something. I’d seen him maybe three times in the week or so I’d known Lucien.

A week. It seemed so much longer than that.

Was I overreacting? Was I expecting things from Lucien that it was too early to expect? Was it the conversation Rachel had been having that made me feel this way? Or was it something more? Would Lucien even appreciate us showing up on his front doorstep in the middle of the night?

I wasn’t sure, to be honest. I mean, I had just disappeared from his hotel room. He called my dad, but maybe he thought that was good enough. Maybe he was washing his hands of me now. Maybe he didn’t care if I was rescued, if I came back to him. Maybe…

Was I being stupid?

“I’m sure he’s fine,” Rachel said.

I glanced at her. “Maybe we shouldn’t be invading his privacy.”

“We’re not. I’m bringing you back to him after kidnapping you.”

“Maybe he wasn’t concerned about me.”

“I’m sure he was.”

I pulled to a stop in the driveway and seriously thought about just throwing the transmission into reverse and backing out. Rachel reached over and touched my arm.

“Are you upset because he’s here instead of in Katy?”

I didn’t answer her, but I guess I didn’t have to.

“It doesn’t mean anything. Maybe your father told him to stay home, to let him take care of it. It would be the smart thing to do to protect him from the unknown.”

“Maybe.”

It actually made sense. My father would do something like that.

Rachel took my hand and squeezed it. “Come on. Let’s go inside and see what he has to say for himself.”

“Are you going to tell him what you did?”

Rachel’s eyes filled with tears at just the thought. But she sniffed and nodded. “I am. I owe him that much.”

I squeezed her hand. “He’ll understand.”

“Do you?”

I nodded. “I do.”

“I’m sorry. I hope I didn’t hurt you too badly.”

I reached back and touched the bump at the back of my head. “No. I’m good.”

Rachel took a deep breath and sighed. “Okay. Let’s go inside.”

Adrienne

Lucien’s car was in the front drive of his big, beautiful house. I touched the hood, not surprised to find it was still a little warm. The security guard had said that he’d only been here about half an hour.

Rachel opened the front door and called his name. I usually went into the house through the garage, so it was a little weird walking in this way. But the house was already very familiar to me. We’d kissed the first night we met on the couch. I remember how I tried to keep his hands tame, but how desperately I’d wanted his touch. It was a tough situation, one of those things where you really want something but you know you shouldn’t, so you fight it. It had been a long time since someone touched me that way and made me feel the things he made me feel. But I fought it because I didn’t want to get myself embroiled in something I couldn’t control. Somehow, though, I fell, and I fell deep.

“Lucien?” I called, but there was no answer.

Rachel stood in the middle of the living room, turning slightly when I crossed the threshold. And then… I knew the moment the color drained from her face.

He was on the floor on the far side of the narrow breakfast bar, his shirt lifted and blood smeared across his abs. I thought for a moment he’d been shot, but there wasn’t enough blood.

I ran to him, sliding across my knees as I dropped and took his face between my hands.

“There’s a glucagon kit in his bedroom,” Rachel mumbled.

“Get it,” I barked.

She just stood there, her eyes wide and her face pale. I smacked his face so hard that a little color came back into his cheek in the shape of my hand. But only for a moment. He was barely breathing.

“Rachel!”

“I…I don’t know what to do. I can’t move.”

I didn’t know what to do, either. I’d never had a chance to talk to him much about his diabetes. I looked it up on the internet, but what did that teach me? I had no idea how low he was, had no idea if he’d taken anything for it before he passed out.

I searched his pockets, looking for his cellphone. An ambulance seemed like a good idea. Something buzzed. I tugged out the small device that he’d told me was his CGM. It read 45 with a downward arrow.

45. Not good.

“Sugar. We need some sort of sugar.”

Rachel suddenly began to move. “Glucagon,” she said again, using that word I didn’t really understand. But she was moving, running up the stairs.

I smacked his face again, but got no reaction. The number on his CGM slid down even more. 40. 38.

He was going downhill fast.

Rachel was back a moment later, landing so hard on her knees that they popped against the tile floor. She unzipped some little case and pulled out a long syringe that looked twice as lethal as the one I’d seen among Lucien’s diabetic supplies. Her hands were shaking as she drew some fluid into the syringe and then pushed it into a small vial.

“What is it?”

“Sugar. It’ll bring his numbers back up.”

She swirled the vial and then drew that liquid into the syringe. When it was ready, she handed it to me.

“I can’t,” she said, tears rolling down her cheeks.

“Where do I…?”

“Into fat.”

I looked at Lucien, but the man had very little fat on his body. The only thing I knew to do was to turn him and shove the needle into his ass. Everyone has fat in their ass, right? Then I pulled his head into my lap and ran my hands over his head.

“I can’t find his cellphone. Can you call 911?”

Rachel nodded. She got up and went into the kitchen. I picked up Lucien’s CGM and watched the numbers. It moved from 20 to 35, but then it began to slowly go back down. 34. 33. 32. My heart was pounding. I didn’t understand what was happening.

“Does he have more of this sugar stuff?”

Rachel stood in front of me, the phone against her ear.

“No.”

I touched the side of his face, rubbing his jaw roughly with the backs of my fingers.

“Don’t die on me,” I said in my most stern, soldier voice. “Don’t you die on me. Not now. Not when we just found each other. Don’t die.”

I just kept saying it over and over again, big fat teardrops falling on the side of his face in a torrential rainfall of fear and grief. I’d only known this man for a week, but it felt like a lifetime. Already I couldn’t imagine what tomorrow would be like if I didn’t have seeing him to look forward to. I wanted to wake up in his bed, wanted to roll over and find him watching me. I wanted to murmur stupid things in the dark to him, wanted to feel his arms around me, hear the reassuring whisper of his breath.

This wasn’t happening. It couldn’t happen.

But it was.

The paramedics arrived after I don’t know how long. The number of his device was still falling, and the sight of it made my stomach clench. They tugged at my arms, pushed me back as they opened a vein to give him much needed sugar. I watched the fluid flow into his body, a silent prayer going up as I begged my higher power to keep him going, to give that sugar the power it needed to save his life.

They loaded him onto the ambulance, and all I could do was watch it fly away, the siren so loud I couldn’t hear my own heartbeat. Rachel got me into the van, but I don’t remember the ride to the hospital. All I remember is standing in the hallway, waiting for the worst and hoping for the best.

Don’t die. Don’t die. Don’t die. Don’t die.