Chapter 6: Blood Ties
The weeks fell into a strange, new rhythm. Seraphina Valois learned the cadence of the dinner rush, the weight of a laden tray, the art of a polite, vacant smile. The Golden Lotus was a blur of steaming woks and clattering dishes, a sanctuary of mundane stress that left no room for memories. She came home smelling of ginger and sesame oil, her feet aching, her mind blessedly numb. Jules was there more often, appearing in the back office or at the bar, a silent, watchful presence that made the other staff straighten up. He never mentioned the night on the Ferris wheel, or the weight of his hand on her leg. The unspoken thing between them was packed away, another secret in an apartment full of them.
She was tying her shoes by the door, her work apron already looped over her arm, when the knock came. Not Lenny’s cheerful rap, not a delivery guy’s impatient thud. This was precise, authoritative, the sound of someone who expected entry.
Sera froze. She crept to the door, heart beginning a dull, heavy thump against her ribs. She peered through the peephole.
The world outside the fisheye lens warped into a nightmare of polished perfection. A cream-colored trench coat, perfectly fitted. Blood-red lips set in a familiar, displeased line. Eleanor Moreau.
Sera’s breath hitched. She didn’t think. She spun, her shoes squeaking on the floor, and bolted for the only cover—Jules’ bedroom. She slipped inside just as the knocking started again, sharper, more insistent.
She closed the door without a sound, leaving it open a crack. The room enveloped her in his scent—clean linen, faint smoke, his cedar-and-bergamot cologne. It was a mess, but an organized one. Weights in the corner, a stack of worn paperbacks on the floor, the black sheets on his bed rumpled from his sleep. She pressed her back against the wall beside the door, her pulse a frantic bird in her throat.
She heard the front door open. The sigh of hinges.
“Julian.” Her mother’s voice was a surgical instrument, cool and precise.
“Eleanor.” Jules’s reply was flat. A shadow passed the crack—her mother’s silhouette, stepping past him into the apartment. The click of designer heels on the bare floorboards.
A pause. Sera could imagine her mother’s gaze sweeping the room, cataloging the changes: the small potted snake plant on the windowsill, the cheery yellow dish towel Sera had bought hanging by the sink, the two mugs drying on the rack instead of one.
“Well,” Eleanor said, her tone dripping with dry amusement. “You’ve certainly livened up the place. Have you finally gotten yourself a girlfriend?” The question was a probe, disguised as chit-chat.
“What do you want, Eleanor?”
“Is that any way to greet your sister? I was in the neighborhood.” Her heels clicked as she ventured further in. Sera saw a sliver of her profile, the sharp line of her nose. “I’ve been thinking about Seraphina, of course. Worried sick. A mother’s heart, you know.”
“Right,” Jules said, his voice moving as he followed her into the living space. “A mother’s heart. It’s been, what, almost three months? Must have just now started beating.”
“Don’t be crude, Julian. Have you heard from her?”
“Not a word.” His lie was smooth, effortless. “Maybe she ran off with a better guy than that Damien creep you were so fond of.”
The temperature in the apartment seemed to drop several degrees. Sera saw her mother go very still.
“That’s not funny,” Eleanor said, each word an icicle.
“Wasn’t trying to be.”
“Damien Blackwood is a visionary. From an excellent family. Their union was…” she searched for the word, “…beneficial. For everyone. It was more than a college fling, Julian. It was an understanding. An engagement.”
Sera’s blood turned to slush in her veins. She felt the floor tilt. An understanding. The brand on her stomach burned like a fresh wound. She squeezed her eyes shut, but through the crack she saw Jules go rigid. The color drained from his knuckles where he held them at his sides. Sera backed up until the back of her legs hit Julian’s bed and she sat there.
“An engagement,” he repeated, the word utterly dead.
“A private one, of course. Between two old families. Meant to be sealed before graduation. Seraphina’s… instability… forced a delay.” Eleanor sighed, the sound full of manufactured regret. “I just thought, if she were to reach out to anyone on that ridiculous rebellious streak, it might be you. You always did have a penchant for collecting strays.”
Jules let out a short, humorless breath. “I left that side of the family for a reason, El. Your husband’s money, your country club deals, your… arrangements. I want no part of it. And I’d appreciate if you didn’t show up at my home unannounced to drag that world through my door.”
“This is about my daughter.”
“You lost the right to call her that when you traded her for a business deal.” His voice was low now, a dangerous rumble. “Get out.”
For a long moment, there was only the hum of the neon sign. Then Eleanor’s heels clicked, sharp and offended, toward the door. “You’re still a thug, Julian. A disappointment. When she winds up hurt, or worse, remember you could have helped.”
The door opened. “The only thing hurting her was you,” Jules said, his voice barely audible. The door closed with a definitive, soft click.
Silence, thick and suffocating.
Sera didn’t move. The words ‘engagement’ and ‘understanding’ bounced around her skull, slicing into every thought. It hadn’t been madness. It had been a transaction. Her mother had known. Had approved.
The bedroom door pushed open. Jules stood there, his face a mask of controlled fury. He looked past her, through the window, then his gaze landed on her. He walked in, the weight of him shifting the floorboards. He sat heavily on the edge of the bed beside her, leaving a careful foot of space between them.
He didn’t speak for a full minute. Then he ran a hand over his jaw, the stubble making a sandpaper sound.
“Sooo,” he said, the single word laden with a black, boiling irony. “An engagement to that douche bag?”
A hysterical laugh bubbled in Sera’s throat and died. She leaned back, letting herself fall onto his bed. The black sheets were cool against her back. She stared at the water-stained ceiling. “Not by choice.”
“I figured.” The bed dipped as he shifted, leaning back on his hands, not looking at her.“Your mother. She’s a piece of work.”
“She’s a gilded cage,” Sera whispered.
The silence pooled around them again, but this one was different. Charged. She was acutely aware of the fact that she was lying on his bed, in his room, surrounded by the intimate evidence of his life. The fight with her mother, the revelation, the protective rage rolling off him in waves—it all coalesced into a weird, heightened intimacy.
She turned her head on the pillow to look at him. He was staring straight ahead at the opposite wall, his profile stark. The anger was still there, tight in the line of his shoulder, the clench of his jaw.
But then his gaze slid to her. He looked down at her lying there, her short hair fanning on his pillow, her work clothes soft and rumpled. He stared. And stared. His eyes, usually so guarded, were dark and unreadable. Then, slowly, deliberately, his gaze traveled down the length of her body—over the curve of her hip in her jeans, the dip of her waist, the rise of her chest under her shirt—and back up to her face.
The air grew thick, hard to breathe.
“You know, Sera,” he said, his voice a rough, low scrape she’d never heard before. “You really shouldn’t tempt a single man by laying in his bed and looking at him the way you are.”
The words hung between them, a tangible, dangerous thing. His eyes held hers, and in them, she saw the same confusing, terrifying heat she felt coiling in her own stomach. It was more than protectiveness. It was a current, raw and undeniable.
He blinked, as if shaking himself out of a trance. A muscle in his jaw flexed. Abruptly, he pushed himself off the bed, breaking the spell. He didn’t look back. He just walked out of the room, closing the door behind him with a quiet, final sound.
Sera lay perfectly still, the echo of his words vibrating in her bones. The scent of his cologne on the sheets was now overwhelming. Down the hall, she heard the front door open and slam shut. He was gone.
She finally let out the breath she was holding. It shuddered from her lungs. She brought a trembling hand to her face. The engagement was a cold, corporate fact. But this… this forbidden thing with Jules, this was a live wire, spitting and sparking in the dark, and she had no idea if touching it would save her or burn her whole world down.
But this… this forbidden thing with Jules, this was a live wire, spitting and sparking in the dark, and she had no idea if touching it would save her or burn her whole world down. She fled his room, the ghost of his gaze like a physical warmth on her skin. The shift at The Golden Lotus that night was a welcome storm of chaos, a frantic distraction of clattering plates and shouted orders. Flirtatious men tried to catch her eye, their smiles sliding off the flat, professional mask she wore. She moved through the rush on autopilot, her mind replaying his low voice in the dim bedroom. You really shouldn’t tempt a single man.
Jules was a silent statue at the end of the bar, watching everything. He watched the men watching her. His knuckles were white around a glass of soda water. When her shift ended, he wordlessly fell into step beside her for the walk home, the city night pressing in close and humid. The silence between them was a taut wire, thrumming with everything unsaid since her mother’s visit.
He unlocked the apartment door and went straight for the high shelf, bypassing beer for the clear, harsh vodka. Sera headed for the shower, her muscles screaming from hours on her feet. The hot water sluiced away the grease and perfume of the restaurant, but it did nothing to quiet the static in her nerves. She was so exhausted, her thoughts thick and slow, that she forgot to bring her pajamas into the bathroom with her.
Wrapped in a towel, she cracked the door. Steam billowed into the cooler living room. He was at the kitchen island, his back to her, leaning over a short glass of vodka. The neon sign painted his shoulders in lurid red. If he stays like that, then she’s safe. She took a breath and darted across the open space, bare feet silent on the wood.
She was almost to her door, hand reaching for the knob, when a prickle ran up her spine. She looked over her shoulder.He was staring. His head was turned, his profile etched against the kitchen’s gloom, his eyes locked on the naked line of her back, the curve of her hip barely tucked into the towel. The raw hunger in his look was a physical shock. He snapped his gaze away the instant he realized she’d caught him, turning back to his drink with a jerky motion.
She rushed inside and slammed the door, leaning against it, panting. Her heart was a frantic drum against her ribs. She heard the scrape of his stool, his footsteps approaching her door. They stopped. A long beat of silence hung in the hall.
“I’m sorry, Sera,” his voice came through the wood, thick and rough. “I’m so sorry, I…” He trailed off. She heard him exhale, a defeated sound, and his footsteps retreated.
She dressed in her usual pajamas: a thin, worn tank top and soft shorts. The fabric felt insubstantial, a negligible barrier. She opened her door and found him back on the couch, the sitcom’s laugh track jarring and bright. He had refilled his glass. He didn’t look at her as she approached.
“You know that drinking is bad for you, right?” she asked, her voice sounding small.
He started, as if he hadn’t heard her come out. He stared at the glass in his hand, then at her, but said nothing as she sank onto the cushion beside him. The space between them was charged, electric. She could feel the heat coming off him. She pretended not to notice his eyes, dark and intent, dropping to the points of her nipples, visible through the thin cotton. A dangerous, giddy power surged through her. She was playing with fire, and after a lifetime of being burned, she found she liked the warmth.
He held out his glass wordlessly. An offering, a challenge. She took it, her fingers brushing his. The sip was small, but the vodka burned a clean, terrible path down her throat. It seemed to crystallize the chaos in her head. Her fears, her mother’s betrayal, the brand, his eyes on her skin—it all sharpened into a single, diamond-point of want. She knew what she wanted.
She set the glass on the table with a decisive click. He watched her hand, then her face, confusion etching his features. She didn’t give him time to process. In one fluid motion, she swung a leg over his lap and straddled him, settling her weight onto his thighs.
His eyes widened, shock freezing him for a second. “Sera, what are you—”
She didn’t speak. She just fit herself against him, the soft cotton of her shorts meeting the hard ridge of his erection straining against his jeans. A low, choked sound escaped him. She began to move, a slow, deliberate roll of her hips, grinding herself against the solid length of him.
“Stop,” he groaned, his hands coming up to grip her hips, but not to push her away. His fingers dug into her flesh, holding her in place. “We can’t. This is—”
She leaned forward, silencing him with the press of her body, her breasts against his chest. She found a rhythm, a building friction that made her breath catch. He was fighting himself, his body arching up into her even as his head tilted back, his eyes squeezed shut in denial. “Jesus Christ,” he whispered, the words strained.
His resistance was a palpable force, a trembling in the arms that held her. But his hips began to answer hers, a shallow, reluctant thrust upward. His grip tightened, pulling her harder against him, grinding her down onto him. The friction through their clothes was maddening, a hot, building pressure. One of his hands slid from her hip up her back, under her tank top, his palm searing against her skin. He buried his face against her neck, his breath hot and ragged, his earlier protests dissolving into ragged gasps that matched the shift of their bodies. The world narrowed to this: the rough fabric, the hard muscle underneath her, the broken sound of his surrender in her ear, and the terrifying, glorious feeling of being wanted by someone who knew every broken part of her and hadn’t looked away.