Page 29 of Brutal Heir (Ruthless Heirs #3)

ROOM TO brEATHE

R ory

The rain tastes like metal, bitter and sharp, as I race down the street. Every footstep echoes like it belongs to someone chasing me. I’m not running from the club. I’m running from the look in Alessandro’s eyes. Cold. Final.

The icy droplets dribble down my cheeks, mixing with a stray tear as I stomp toward Midtown.

Hugging my arms around my trembling body, I swipe away the tear with a bitter twist to my lips, lengthening my stride.

I hate that I had to ask my old roommate for a place to crash for the night, but staying with Alessandro just isn’t an option right now.

I need some space.

Some room to breathe.

When I’m with him, his presence is too overpowering, all-consuming. I find myself trapped in that hypnotic gaze, a helpless fly caught in a silky web. Seeing him tonight like that, so cold and distant broke something inside me.

It snapped me from that fog of denial I’ve been comfortably residing in for weeks.

Alessandro may be a survivor, scarred and battered, but he’s so much more. That familiar darkness resides deep in his veins, buried under the marred flesh and torn up soul. It lingers as clearly as my own.

And I want no part of it.

The cold bites through my jacket like frosty punishment, the fire of adrenaline from the club long extinguished by the icy Manhattan wind. Heels clicking too loudly against the pavement, I clutch my coat tighter around my shoulders and head east toward 2nd Avenue. Toward somewhere, anywhere, safe.

I keep my head down, hair whipping across my face, throat still raw from emotion, from fear, from everything. My heart’s still beating too hard, but at least out here, I can breathe. The music’s gone, the walls are gone, he’s gone.

Still, something prickles beneath my skin. That low, crawling feeling at the base of my neck like I’m being watched. Followed.

I risk a glance over my shoulder.

Nothing but shadows and lingering city noise. Just a man across the street lighting a cigarette. Just a couple arguing outside a late-night falafel spot. Just the December wind.

“Get a grip, Rory,” I mutter under my breath, forcing my legs to keep moving. “Not everyone’s out to get ya.”

Even if it feels like they are.

I take a turn onto a quieter street, one block from Mack’s place. My steps quicken. Not because I’m scared I tell myself. Just because I want this night to be over. Because I need to be somewhere alone with my thoughts. Somewhere he can’t reach.

But the feeling doesn't fade.

If anything, it grows.

That prickle intensifies until I’m casting another glance over my shoulder, then another.

Nothing.

I’ve lost my ever-loving mind. It’s the gory scene at the club that has my nerves on edge. No one is following me. Why would they be?

Slowing my manic strides, I glance up, nearly racing right past the designated address. Stopping, I scan my phone to confirm I’m at the right place. Mack and Shelly’s new apartment. I just hope her love life is going better than mine.

Pressing my finger to the buzzer, a sharp click resounds, and the lock disengages. Yanking the door open, I dart inside and out of the freezing rain.

The second the door clicks shut behind me, my shoulders drop. My lungs stretch wide for the first time in hours. Inside smells like old takeout and vanilla candles and everything that isn’t him.

I release a shuddering breath and lean against the cinderblock wall.

Safe.

Sipping my warm caramel macchiato as I head toward the subway station the next morning, I ignore the slivers of unease rising from the evening before. The grisly body. Alessandro’s reaction. The sensation of being followed.

Then the nightmare that had kept me tossing and turning all night.

I jolt awake on the couch, a scream lodged in my throat, sweat slick on my skin. The blanket is a tangled mess around my legs, twisted like chains, pinning me to the cushions as my heart slams against my ribs.

It’s the same nightmare. Always the same.

The weight pressing me down. The cold stink of sweat and cheap cologne. The rasp of his breath against my ear. The rip of fabric tearing as I fought, as I clawed, as I begged ? —

A choked sob breaks free before I can swallow it down.

I slap a hand over my mouth, squeezing my eyes shut, but it doesn’t stop the images.

It doesn’t stop the feel of him on top of me, doesn’t stop the memory of my own voice, too hoarse to scream, biting down on my tongue until I tasted blood just to keep from making a sound.

“You’re not there anymore,” I whisper to myself, hoping Shelly and Mack don’t hear. “You’re not her anymore.”

But it feels like I am.

The shadows in the unfamiliar room shift, stretching like hands reaching for me. I can’t breathe. I can’t breathe ? —

I kick at the blanket, fighting to get free, nearly falling off the couch as I scramble, my hands shaking as they clutch at the side table. The lamp teeters, wobbles, before I manage to steady it, my breath tearing in and out of my lungs in shallow, desperate gasps.

My eyes dart to the thin line of light under the door that leads to Shelly and Mack’s room. Not to Alessandro’s. If I’d been at home, at the penthouse, he’d be just on the other side. One word, one knock, and he’d be there.

No. You don’t need him. And he doesn’t need your brokenness bleeding all over him. He has enough to deal with.

Except maybe I do need him.

My knees pull up to my chest, and I hug them tight, pressing my forehead against them as I rock, back and forth, back and forth, like that might quiet the chaos screaming in my head.

“Breathe,” I whisper, the word shaking. “Just breathe.”

But even as I sit there, the dark presses in around me. I can still smell him, feel the weight of him, hear the low, vicious chuckle he made before everything went black.

And I know no matter how far I’ve run, no matter how many walls I build, some ghosts always find a way to follow.

I banish the dark thoughts and focus on the sunlight, on the chaotic pulse of the city to ground me. It was just a nightmare brought on by the night’s grisly events. That bastard will never hurt me again.

Inhaling a fortifying breath, I walk on. Unlike last night, the streets are bustling with cars and pedestrians rushing to work.

Today, I’m not one of those people.

Instead, I’m going to make up for a long overdue visit with an old friend.

There’s only one person in this godforsaken city who won’t tell me to forgive and forget. Only one soul I trust to call bullshite when they see it. Paddy Flaherty.

And no, this little excursion has nothing to do with the fact that I’m trying to avoid Alessandro.

Or his dozens of text messages.

And voicemails.

Dipping down beneath the busy streets to the subway platform, my thoughts drift between my dark past and bleak future. I refuse to read the messages from Alessandro. If I do, I know I’ll lose all resolve.

And if I’m being perfectly honest with myself, I know I’ll have to go back home—I mean his penthouse—eventually.

Damn it, his apartment is not my home! Why do I keep doing that?

Probably for the same reason I keep imagining Alessandro’s lips pressed against my own.

The subway screeches into the station, whipping strands of brilliant red hair across my face.

Holding my coat tight around myself, I squeeze through the sliding doors, battling a guy with an expensive brief case in a three-piece suit and a teenager toting a cello, and drop down in a seat.

At least Shelly had been nice enough to lend me a new set of clothes, so I wasn’t forced to walk the streets in that scandalous dress all day.

Seeking refuge at the home of the newly cohabitating lovebirds was a big mistake. I shake my head, trying my best to loosen the nauseatingly sweet images of my old roommate and her boyfriend making out on the couch all night. The couch I had to sleep on.

I mean Jesus, Mary and Joseph, I’m not against a little PDA, but that was out of control.

My phone buzzes in my coat again, and I pull it out this time just to make sure it’s not Paddy. I scan the screen and immediately regret it.

Alessandro: Please come home, Rory. I need you .

I shove the phone back into my coat pocket, but it’s too late. The damage has been done. A tangle of unwanted emotions batters my chest, ripping me apart from the inside. Because God, as much as I refuse to admit it, I need him too.

What feels like seconds later with the intense company of my churning thoughts, the subway grinds to a halt at the Lower East Side station. As I trudge the remaining walk to Holy Cross Nursing Home, I mentally chastise myself for not having come sooner.

Paddy Flaherty is the only patient I still keep in touch with.

Over the year he’d become like family. Like me, he had no other relatives here in Manhattan, and truth be told, the man was a laugh riot.

Even after his cruel past. His wife had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, and he was her sole caretaker.

One day, she’d left the stove on and nearly burned down the entire building.

Paddy barely survived. His wife wasn’t as lucky.

After a quick check-in at the front desk where I flash my nursing credentials, I wander through the quiet halls, straight for Paddy’s room. Most of the residents are still asleep, though I catch glimpses of a few in various states of undress as I pass their rooms.

The scent of antiseptic and mint tea greets me as I step into Paddy Flaherty’s tiny, cluttered studio. Same as always. Same as it was nearly twelve months ago when I first met the cranky old bastard, swaddled in gauze and cursing out every nurse in the burn unit.

“Hey Paddy, you in here?” I whisper as I scan the empty room.

“Is that you, girl?” The familiar bark seeps through the bathroom door.

“It’s me,” I call out, slipping off my coat and kicking the door shut with my heel. “You decent, or should I shield my eyes?”

“Depends. You bring biscuits?”

I grin as I pull the coffee shop bag from my coat pocket. I knew very well I wouldn’t be welcome without them. “Of course. Chocolate ones, too.”

“That’s my girl,” he grumbles.

The bathroom door swings open, and I squeeze my eyes closed before I’m subjected to every inch of his wrinkly, scarred skin.

“Paddy!” I shriek. “You’re as naked as the day you crawled out of your poor mother and twice as wrinkled!”

A gruff chuckle fills the air, and I can almost see that mischievous grin.

“Put your clothes on, mister.”

“All right, all right.”

Keeping my eyes closed for what seems like forever, I regret not offering to help him dress. It’s not like I haven’t done it dozens of times before.

“Okay, all finished.” I follow the sound of his gravelly voice into the living room where he sits in his recliner like a king on a tattered throne, flannel blanket over his lap, scarred hands folded atop it.

His skin, like Alessandro’s, is a patchwork of grafts and burns, shiny in places, tight in others. But Paddy doesn’t hide it. Never has.

“You’re late,” he adds as I hand him the biscuits and settle into the chair beside him.

“I’m early,” I counter. “You just like pretending you’re dying every hour of the day.”

“Feck off,” he mutters, but there’s no heat to it. His watery blue eyes crinkle at the corners as he rips open the bag with his good hand. “You look like shite.”

“Gee, thanks.” I lean back with a sigh. “Rough week.”

“Still playing nursemaid to that Italian lad with the face like a war map?”

I snort. “Something like that.”

Though I haven’t visited since I started working for Alessandro, I have still kept in touch. So he knows a bit about what’s been going on in my life.

He munches a biscuit and peers at me, crumbs sticking to his stubbled chin. “You got that look, girl. Like the whole damn world’s closing in.”

“It feels like it is.”

Silence stretches between us, thick with all the things I can’t say and all the things he already knows.

He knows bits and pieces, without too many details to get either of us in trouble.

He doesn’t push. Never does. That’s why I come here, because Paddy may be rough and half-rotted from loss, but he listens.

And he gets it . His wife, Moira, lit the match that changed his life.

He’s been alone ever since.

Like me.

“You still my family, Paddy?” I ask softly, voice rough around the edges. “Even though I haven’t been around as much lately?”

He eyes me for a long moment, then reaches out and clasps my wrist in his gnarled hand. “You’re the only pain in the arse I got left, girl.”

I want to tell him everything. About the man with the scars. The almost kiss. The body. The way it all feels too big for my chest to hold.

A lump lodges in my throat. I nod, blinking too fast.

“Good,” I whisper. “’Cause I need your advice.”

He leans over and pats my hand. “That’s what I’m here for.”