Page 43

Chapter 42

Ruin

She’s trembling against the counter, still panting from the force of her orgasm, her knuckles white where they’re braced against the marble. And fuck, she’s beautiful like this—shattered and furious and mine.

Her body is still clenching helplessly around my fingers when I drag them from her slowly, savoring the way she shudders at the loss. I bring them to my mouth, licking her taste from my glove like a man starved.

But the haze barely lifts before the storm comes roaring back.

"You," she rasps, voice shaky but sharpening fast. "You were with me. The whole time. On my team. Helping me hunt Javier."

I watch her, chest heaving, hair wild, lingerie twisted and clinging to her flushed skin. My beautiful little hurricane.

She turns and shoves at my chest—weakly, but enough to make her anger clear. "How the fuck could you be that close and never tell me?"

I catch her wrists—not to restrain, just to steady her. "Seanna—"

"No!" she snaps, ripping free and pacing away, her arms crossing tight over her chest like she's trying to hold herself together. "You watched me bleed. You let me trust you—and still, you lied."

I move slowly, hands out in surrender, voice rough from holding too much back. "It wasn’t supposed to happen like this."

She spins on me, eyes blazing. "Wasn’t supposed to happen? What, Matteo?"

The way she says my name—like it’s poison and a prayer all at once—cuts straight to the bone.

I shake my head, throat tight. "When we first infiltrated your life, it was just about getting close. Watching from inside your circle. Becoming important to you."

Her laugh is bitter, broken. "Congratulations. Mission accomplished."

"We would’ve told you," I rasp. "Eventually. But your hunt for Javier—it sped everything up."

She freezes, a ripple passing through her.

I press on, needing her to hear it. "Rule heard his father's threat against you. After that, slow wasn't an option anymore. Protecting you became everything."

She trembles, and for the first time since I touched her, it isn't from lust. It's from the weight of everything she’s been forced to carry.

"You made it impossible for me to hate you," she whispers, like the words wound her to say them.

God, I feel that in my fucking bones.

She turns her face away, scrubbing a hand across her mouth like she can erase the truth. "You were there for everything. After every op. Every late night. Every time I thought I was alone—you were there."

I cross to her, slow and sure, desperate to close the distance she keeps trying to put between us.

"I never stopped watching your back," I say low, the words cracking raw in my chest. "Even when you didn’t know it. Especially then."

She lets out a broken sound, somewhere between a laugh and a sob. "You know what kills me?"

I shake my head, helpless.

"You were inside my life," she whispers. "Right there beside me. Day after day. Sitting next to me in briefings, fighting beside me in the field. Laughing with me after the missions when I let myself believe the world wasn’t so broken."

I flinch inwardly.

I know she didn’t have this harsh reaction to Bodhi. I listened. But Bodhi... he showed up when necessary, for missions with the organization and afternoon training where he could place himself in her path. But me? I was there nearly every day. I lived in the trenches with her. I sat beside her for hours, shoulder to shoulder, breathing the same air, pretending like every moment wasn't slicing me open because I couldn’t have her the way I needed to. I was the one bleeding with her. Drinking with her. Watching her try to stitch herself back together while I barely held myself in one piece.

I lived in the spaces between her breaths.

And fuck if it didn’t destroy me every single goddamn day.

"It gutted me," I rasp, dragging the words from somewhere deeper than my ribs, "what was worse was watching you at those clubs after missions. Celebrating. Laughing. Dancing with boys who didn’t even know how to touch you. Watching them try—and knowing they'd never satisfy you the way I could. The way we could."

Her shoulders hitch slightly, her hands tightening against her sides as if she’s trying to hold herself together.

"Every time you smiled at them," I say, softer now, "every time you let yourself believe for one second that they could see you the way I do—it tore me apart."

Her breath catches, but she doesn't move away.

"You deserved better," I whisper, taking another step forward, close enough now that I can feel the heat radiating off her skin. "And every goddamn night, I dreamed about giving it to you."

Her chin lifts, defiant and trembling. "And yet you lied to me."

"I lied to protect you," I say, rough and breaking. "I lied because I didn’t know how to be close to you without wanting to destroy the world for you."

She swallows hard.

I step even closer, my hand lifting to brush her jaw with a touch so reverent it feels like prayer. "But, I wasn’t lying the other day," I murmur, voice thick with everything I've never been able to say. "I’ve wanted to taste your lips for so fucking long."

Her breath stutters.

And then I kiss her.

Not rough. Not brutal.

A kiss so slow, so desperate, it feels like I’m trying to memorize the shape of her mouth against mine—like I’m trying to stitch something broken back together with nothing but touch and breath and the hollowed-out pieces of everything I never said. A kiss born from years of silent wanting, from restraint worn down to rust and ruin. From the silent obsession in every stolen glance, every unspoken word. A kiss heavy with all the promises I never dared to make aloud.

A kiss that tastes like regret and hope twisted into something unbearable.

I pour it all into her—the mistakes, the obsession, the devotion that’s carved me open and hollowed me out until only she remained inside me. Everything I am. Everything I could never be without her. I give it to her now like an offering, knowing it will never be enough to fix what I've broken.

I kiss her like she’s oxygen and I’ve been drowning for years.

My hand skims her side with aching reverence, tracing the curve of her waist, the trembling tension under her skin. My fingers brush over the lingerie we bought for her—the fragile black lace clinging to her like a second skin, like a brand burned into her for no one but us.

And still—still—I want more. Not just her body. Her trust. Her fury. Her broken, beautiful heart.

Even if I know I’ll never deserve it.

She stiffens slightly, pulling back just enough to breathe. Her forehead rests against mine, breaths mingling between us.

"I don't know how to forgive you," she whispers.

"I don’t expect you to," I murmur back. "But you should know... it was never a game."

She shakes her head slowly, a few stray tears slipping free.

"You broke everything I thought was safe," she says, voice cracking open under the weight of it.

I close my eyes briefly, feeling her words rip straight through me. Because she’s right. I didn’t just break her trust—I shattered the foundation she built her entire life on. I tore apart the belief that her instincts, her choices, could protect her. I made her doubt the one thing she was supposed to be able to trust—herself.

"I know," I rasp, my voice thick. "I was supposed to be the safe one. The one you didn't have to question. The one standing beside you when everything else went to hell."

Her eyes shine with something furious and betrayed, something that cuts deeper than any blade ever could.

"You were ," she says bitterly. "You were the steady one. The one I didn't second-guess. You were the ground under my feet when everything else was burning—and you let me lean on you while you lied."

Her words crack something open inside me. A wound I know I'll never stitch closed again.

"You made me believe I could trust you," she whispers, voice splintering. "And now... now I don't know if I can trust anything."

"I know," I breathe against her skin. "But I swear to you, Seanna... I was yours long before you ever knew."

Another trembling breath leaves her, shaky and uneven.

Her eyes close for a second, her whole body folding in on itself like she’s trying to hold together the broken pieces.

I just stand there, breathing with her, feeling the crack in the world we built between us.

God, if I could take it back. If I could undo every lie stitched into the seams of us.

But I can't.

And somehow, she's still standing.

She pulls back a little more, steel finding its way back into her spine.

"I need a fucking shower," she mutters, voice rough, brittle around the edges.

I smile softly, brushing my knuckle along the lace at her hip. "Want some help?"

She scoffs, fire sparking back to life in her gaze. "Get the fuck out, Matteo. I know damn well if you step into that shower, I'm getting railed against the glass."

I chuckle low, dark, and wrecked, backing away with my hands raised in mock surrender. But fuck, the image carves itself into my skull like a brand I'll never scrape off.

"Would that really be so bad?" I throw back, voice rasping with promise.

She flips me off, and it’s the most beautiful fucking thing I’ve ever seen.

I move to the door, pausing just outside it to rake one last hungry look down her body—memorizing the rage, the heartbreak, the goddamn fire that makes her who she is.

"We will be waiting in the living room, little storm," I promise, voice thick with everything I can't say. "Don’t be long."

She slams the door in my face.

And for a long moment, I stand there, leaning against it. Breathing her in.

And knowing—knowing with a hollow, aching certainty—that I will never want anything the way I want her.

Even if it costs me everything.