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“What’re you doing here?” I choke out, pulling the towel around me, though it can’t possibly hide the damage that’s already been exposed.

“Lorenzo said you looked upset. I came to check on you and heard crying.”

He reaches for me then hesitates, his hand suspended in the space between us. Even now, he’s careful with boundaries. Waiting for permission.

My heart cracks at his thoughtfulness.

“Tell me what happened,” he says, and his voice has changed, dropping an octave into something primal. “Who did this to you?”

I shrink back, clutching the towel tighter. Words feel like too much because the burns are pulsing with phantom pain, each one carrying its own memory of humiliation and agony.

“Aurelia.” He softens his voice and inches closer. “Please. Let me help you.”

The gentleness undoes me. I’ve spent so long fighting against weakness, against vulnerability, but I’m too raw to maintain the fortress of my defenses. My lips tremble, and I hear a foreign, broken voice that I barely recognize as my own .

“Your mother.”

His entire body goes rigid, muscles tensing like I slapped him. The room seems to darken around the edges and the air grows dense with a silent fury that vibrates from his every pore.

“She—” I clear my throat. “She and her friends. Julian wasn’t there, so they…

” I pull in a ragged breath. “They held me down and… took turns.” My tears are hot trails on my cheeks.

“They laughed. Just like they did with my mother. Lady Harrow told me while they burned me. She told me how she used to hold my mother down the same way. She said it was tradition.”

I’m sobbing now, the confession tearing out of me like it has claws.

Adrian moves toward me slowly, deliberately, and when his arms encircle me, I collapse against him.

My body remembers this—the safety of his embrace on the rare occasions he held me.

Only this time, his body isn’t stiff. He melts into me as much as I do to him.

Here, in his arms, is the only place I’ve felt truly protected since this nightmare began, so I cling to him.

“My mother kept a diary. She wrote down everything. The torture, the humiliation, all of it. They treated her like she wasn’t human, like she was just a toy for their amusement.

And then they did the same to me.” I’m shaking uncontrollably now.

“I was going to tell you everything about the diary, about what she went through?—”

“I know,” he says gently, cutting me off with a softness that stops my spiral. His hand strokes my hair, his heartbeat steady against my ear. “I know. ”

I pull back, confused. “You know?”

“Not everything. But enough. Lorenzo told me about the letter his mother received, and it detailed the abuse.” His jaw tightens.

“After that, I started digging through my father’s private papers.

I found evidence. I even suspected my mother was part of it.

I wanted to talk with you about what I found, that’s why I asked you to meet me that one night.

Somehow, my mother found out and she shot me before I could share my findings with you. ”

The way he says “evidence” tells me everything I need to know. My stomach turns as I imagine what he discovered—photos, videos, the documentation of cruelty that men like Lucian Harrow collect like trophies.

“It was worse than I could have imagined,” Adrian continues.

“What they did to her—what they’ve done to so many women over the years—” He stops, swallowing hard.

“It’s hard to even think about. And the fact that my mother participated and has now hurt you…

” His voice hardens. “She will pay for what she’s done. To your mother. To you. I swear it.”

The cold vengeance in his voice startles me. This isn’t the level-headed Adrian I’ve known for years. This is someone else entirely—someone with depths of emotion I’ve never been allowed to see.

“But she’s your mother,” I whisper, studying his face.

Something darkens in his eyes. “Not anymore. I don’t know who she is.

Maybe she was always like that, maybe Lucian made her that way, but either way, there’s no saving her.

” He shifts, releasing me long enough to lift the edge of his shirt.

There, on his abdomen, is an angry knot of puckered flesh, the unmistakable mark of a bullet wound. “Here’s the proof.”

My fingers reach out and trace the raised scar. It’s proof of his mother’s betrayal and of how close I came to losing him forever. The reality of it hits me, and my voice catches.

“I thought you were dead. For weeks, I thought…” The memory of his body on the floor flashes through my mind. “I thought I’d lost you. And I couldn’t bear it. I know things were… difficult between us, but remembering the good times… that’s what kept me going.”

His eyes soften, and something shifts in his expression—a vulnerability that seems to physically pain him. He looks as if he’s balancing on the edge of a confession.

What does he want to say?

But whatever it is stays unspoken. Instead, he glances at the razor still sitting on the counter, then back at me. “Were you grooming?”

I nod, feeling a little embarrassed at my hairy legs that he can see.

Without a word, he helps me to my feet and guides me to sit on the edge of the tub.

“May I?” he asks, picking up the razor and a bottle of shaving cream.

The question—so simple, so respectful of my autonomy after weeks of having none—brings fresh tears to my eyes. I nod.

He sits on the closed toilet and moves my right leg so it rests across his lap.

With movements that are both clinical and tender, he applies cream to my legs, then begins the careful work of shaving. His hands are steady as they guide the blade over my skin, but he’s making a mess of his expensive slacks. Cream is dripping all over them.

He doesn’t seem to notice or care as he continues, and I can’t stop the tears from slipping out.

This simple act of care undoes me more completely than any grand gesture could have. It’s intimate without being sexual, affectionate without being demanding. It’s the first time in weeks someone has touched me without taking, without hurting.

When he reaches my thighs, where the worst of the burns are, he pauses. Gently, reverently, he bends forward and presses his lips to one of the ugly marks. Then another. And another.

“Battle scars,” he murmurs against my skin. “Not signs of weakness. Signs that you survived. That you endured.” His eyes lift to mine, blue fire burning in their depths. “That you’ll get revenge.”

Something ignites within me at his words—a rekindling of purpose that I’d nearly forgotten in the chaos of recent weeks. The ember of vengeance that has fueled me for so long, nearly extinguished by Julian’s cruelty, flares back to life.

My lips curve in a way that feels both foreign and familiar. “ We’ll get revenge,” I say.

His smile is slow, dangerous, and beautiful.