If you are looking for While I Was Bleeding Out He Lit Lanterns For Her Chapter 1 read online…
Chapter 524
Chapter 524:
“What happened to the car?” she asked, glancing at the driver.
Crawford smiled with convincing helplessness. “Water in the intake, I think. My driver is calling a tow truck now p>
Then Crawford’s dark brows pulled together sharply. He pressed his right hand hard into the center of his stomach and bent slightly forward, his facial muscles tightening with what appeared to be genuine, severe pain.
“Are you all right?” June asked. Her heart jumped. She thought immediately of the car crash in Boston — the image of him using his body to shield her from the impact.
Crawford drew a sharp, shallow breath. Fine beads of cold sweat appeared at his hairline.
рo𝘱𝗎𝗅𝘢r s𝘵𝘰𝗋і𝘦s 𝘰𝗻
“An old problem,” he said, his voice slightly strained. “Stomach spasms from the crash injuries. They flare up when I’ve been in back-to-back meetings without eating p>
It was a flawless, precisely calibrated strike — the guilt of a saved life, combined with the disarming power of physical vulnerability.
June looked at his pained expression. The thick wall she kept around her heart cracked, just slightly. This man had nearly died for her. She could not walk away and leave him standing in the rain.
“There is a quiet Italian restaurant on the corner,” she said, pointing down the street to a storefront glowing with warm amber light. “Let me help you inside. You can sit down and get something hot p>
For one fraction of a second, a dark gleam of victory moved through Crawford’s eyes.
On the surface, he simply looked grateful and spent.
He nodded slowly and lifted his arm, draping it over June’s shoulders and letting half his weight lean against her side. They walked together beneath the single black umbrella, their silhouettes close and strangely intimate under the blurred glow of the streetlights.
Behind them, the moment they turned the corner, the driver’s anxious expression vanished. He quietly shut the hood, got back into the Maybach, started the perfectly functional engine without a sound, and eased the car into a dark alley to wait.
The Italian restaurant was dim and elegant. A real wood fire burned in a stone fireplace, and the warmth of it pushed back the cold and the noise of the storm entirely.
June ordered him a bowl of white truffle risotto and a glass of warm lemon water.
Crawford ate a few careful bites. His color returned — gradually, convincingly — to normal.
He leaned back in his chair and began to talk. His tone was gentle and unhurried, completely free of pressure or agenda. He did not mention Cole. He said nothing about the ongoing war on Wall Street. Instead, he spoke about a recent art exhibition in Europe, and shared a handful of obscure, dry, genuinely funny stories about historical scientists.
His knowledge was broad and precise. His timing was impeccable. He navigated around every one of June’s psychological defenses with the patience of a man who had studied the terrain in advance.