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Chapter Nineteen

Bradley

T he door to Nico’s apartment creaked open and warm light spilled out onto the landing. I followed Nico inside like a ghost who didn’t know he’d died yet.

The apartment was… beautiful. That was my first impression, but I couldn’t hold on to it long enough to care.

It had exposed brick walls, high ceilings with those metal pipe beams that rich people called industrial, and a sleek kitchen in the corner that looked like it belonged in a Netflix show about a baker who only used oat flour.

There was art on the walls—real art, not prints—and a massive shelf lined with records and books and weird little figurines I didn’t have the brainpower to process.

But none of it mattered.

I could’ve been standing in a penthouse or a jail cell and I don’t think I would’ve registered the difference.

My limbs felt like wet sandbags, and my chest was hollow and echoing, like someone had scooped out everything I had left and forgotten to refill it.

Nico said nothing. He just touched my back gently and guided me forward, like he could sense that if he gave me a single decision to make, I’d collapse right there on the rug.

We walked into the living room. He nudged me toward the couch, a long gray thing that looked way too expensive to sit on while feeling this disgusting. But I didn’t argue. I didn’t have the energy to argue. I sank down into it, elbows on my knees, and stared at the floor.

“Strong drink?” Nico asked softly.

I nodded.

He didn’t ask what kind. He just turned and walked into the kitchen.

I heard the freezer open. The gentle clink of ice.

The sharp pop of a bottle cap. A shaker being pulled down from a cabinet.

It was the kind of domestic rhythm that would’ve felt cozy under any other circumstance.

Right now, it felt like someone playing a lullaby for a corpse.

My whole body buzzed like I’d been electrocuted but left alive to suffer the aftermath. I couldn’t think. Couldn’t feel. Couldn’t even properly cry anymore. Just this dead quiet inside me, like I’d used up every ounce of emotion during the day, and now there was nothing left but static.

I had nothing to show for the worst day of my life except a ruined soul and zero dollars. Not even zero—negative, because the paycheck that was supposed to help me survive had gone directly into the leather-gloved hands of a woman who could probably gut a deer without blinking.

I’d been humiliated, degraded, used as the centerpiece in a porno scene I couldn’t even wrap my head around—and for what? To pay off a debt I should’ve never had in the first place?

I couldn’t remember the last time I’d felt loved. Or even safe.

My parents hadn’t spoken to me since my arrest. Not even a card or a text. Just silence. I didn’t blame them. Not really. Why would anyone want to claim a felon for a son? Why would anyone want to know me?

A glass clicked against the coffee table in front of me.

“Here,” Nico said quietly.

I looked up. He was holding a short tumbler full of amber liquid and ice. I took it. My hand shook so hard I almost dropped it.

“Whiskey sour,” he said, sitting down next to me. “Heavy on the whiskey.”

“Thanks,” I murmured.

I stared at the glass for a second, then tipped it back and drained it in one go. The burn in my throat was the first thing I’d felt in hours. I shut my eyes.

Maybe if I sat still long enough, I’d disappear. Just dissolve into Nico’s expensive couch and never be found again.

I could feel him watching me. I didn’t know what he saw. Some broken animal? Some lost cause?

I didn’t get him. I didn’t. Why was he still here?

What did he see in me that hadn’t already been wrecked?

And worse, was it real? Or was it pity? Was he only here because he felt bad for the sad little ex-con twink who couldn’t stop crying and practically had “Abandon Me” tattooed on his forehead?

I wasn’t good enough for him. Not even close. He was funny and smart and God, he was beautiful, and somehow talented at everything from writing jokes to making drinks. He had a future. I had a criminal record and an extensive catalog of regrets.

Any second now, he’d realize what a mistake I was and ghost me like everybody else.

I opened my eyes, stared blankly at the brick wall across from me. My empty glass sweated in my hand.

Then the couch shifted.

I looked over, and Nico had moved closer. His face was nervous, like even he didn’t know what he was doing. His hands hovered awkwardly in the space between us for a second, and then he opened his arms.

“Come here,” he whispered.

I didn’t even hesitate.

I let the glass fall to the coffee table with a dull clink, then leaned into him like gravity had made the choice for me. His arms wrapped around me, firm and warm, and the second my head hit his chest, I cracked open like a dropped egg.

At first it was just a breath. A tremble. Then my throat made this horrible sound, and I realized I was crying. Really crying. The kind of sobbing you can’t fake. The kind that lives in your lungs and your gut and your bones, and has been waiting months—years—to be let out.

“I’m sorry,” I gasped.

Nico just held me tighter.

“Let it all out,” he whispered.

And I did.

I cried until my nose was running and my eyes stung and I couldn’t breathe through anything but hiccups. I cried like I was emptying out a lifetime of being terrified and alone and trying too hard. And through all of it, Nico held me like he wasn’t afraid of the mess I was making. Like he knew.

Eventually, the storm passed. The sobs turned to sniffles, and the sniffles turned to silence, and I was just… there. A lump of sorrow in his arms.

“I feel like I could sleep for a week,” I mumbled.

Nico didn’t say anything. He just reached down and took my hand.

“Come on,” he breathed.

I let him pull me up. My legs wobbled a little, but I followed him down the hallway to his bedroom. I didn’t take anything in. Didn’t care. Didn’t need to.

The bed was enormous. The sheets were soft. That was all I noticed.

I kicked off my shoes. Didn’t even ask. Just curled up on the far side, in the fetal position, facing the wall. I didn’t want to talk or move. I just wanted to not exist for a while.

A moment later, the mattress shifted again, and I felt Nico behind me. His chest was against my back. His arm wrapping around my waist. And his other hand slid into my hair, smoothing it gently like I was something delicate and precious and not completely ruined.

He said nothing else.

He just held me while I drifted down into the dark.

And for the first time in years, I wasn’t afraid of my own dreams.

* * *

I woke up with a sharp inhale, heart pounding like I’d just escaped something. For a second, I didn’t know where I was. The ceiling above me was unfamiliar—smooth and high, with a ceiling fan spinning slow circles. The bed was too nice, too soft, and smelled faintly of cedar and something citrusy.

I sat up fast.

The room was dark. A streetlamp outside the window cast faint stripes of orange light across the exposed brick wall. Then I heard it.

Nico’s voice—muffled, distant—coming from the other room.

My whole body exhaled.

Right. I was with him. I was safe. Somehow.

My shoulders slumped, and I sank back against the pillows.

Part of me wanted to get up, find him, wrap my arms around his waist and just exist in the warmth of someone who didn’t want to kill me or rob me or use me.

But I didn’t move. Instead, I let my eyes fall shut again and made a conscious, almost desperate effort not to think.

Not about the scene. Not about the paycheck I didn’t get to keep. And not about my parents or my parole or the ice-cold look in Riley’s eyes when she called me a freak.

Blankness felt safer than reflection.

A few minutes passed, or maybe longer. I must’ve dozed off again, because the next thing I knew, the mattress dipped and I felt Nico’s weight slide in beside me.

He pulled me close to him again, like he’d been waiting for me to need him. Like maybe he needed it, too.

I mumbled, barely audible, “Thanks… for letting me sleep here.”

His lips brushed the back of my neck.

That one small gesture almost undid me all over again. It was so soft. So simple. But it felt sacred. Like it meant something bigger than either of us could say out loud.

“You’re safe,” Nico murmured against my skin. “I’m not going anywhere.”

I shut my eyes, and my throat suddenly felt thick.

“You’re wanted,” he added, a little quieter.

I didn’t believe it. Not really. But it felt nice to hear, like being offered a blanket even if you’re too cold to feel it.

“I just got off the phone with Jack,” Nico continued, his voice low and soothing. “He wants to line up more work for you. Fast.”

I tensed.

Nico chuckled, the sound rumbling through his chest like a warm purr. “No. Not another bukkake scene. I swear. Never again.”

I huffed a breath that was almost a laugh.

“He pitched a new series,” Nico said. “Something a little more romantic. Focused on couples. There’ll still be sex—obviously—but it’s got more of a story. More connection. Intimacy. Less glaze and chaos.”

I snorted softly. “I have no shame left in me, so… yeah. Whatever I have to do, I’ll do it. If it pays.”

“You know,” he said, “the pay is actually amazing. Look around.”

I opened my eyes and glanced around the bedroom. Hardwood floors. Plush bedding. Art on the walls. A closet door cracked just enough to reveal a very organized wardrobe.

“This place?” he continued. “Paid for by porn. And maybe some jokes. But mostly porn.”

I rolled over slowly, careful not to disturb the fragile quiet that had settled between us. Our faces were inches apart now, breath mingling in the dim light.

There was a long pause.

“You don’t really want to do porn,” I whispered. “You want to make people laugh. Entertain them.”

He sighed, not in annoyance but like I’d touched something true.

“You’re right,” he breathed. “But if getting naked on camera pays the bills and buys me time to write and tour and bomb open mics until I succeed? Then so be it. I’m not above it. Not anymore.”

He reached up and brushed his fingers through my hair, the motion tender in a way I wasn’t used to.

“What about you?” he asked. “What do you really want?”

My lips parted. I wanted to say love. Or peace. Or to go back in time and make every different choice I possibly could. But the truth was simpler. Uglier. And heavier.

“To survive,” I said. “That’s my sole goal right now. Just… survive. That’s it. Nothing else matters.”

Nico didn’t flinch. He didn’t correct me or call me dramatic or broken.

He reached out instead and gently touched my cheek. His thumb brushed just under my eye. The contact made something in me ache.

Then, slowly, he leaned in and kissed me.

Soft. Careful. No pressure. No expectation.

But it was enough to light my entire body on fire.

I kissed him back—tentatively at first, then deeper. All kinds of feelings slammed into me like waves. Shame. Hope. Fear. Lust. Desperation. Gratitude. Grief. Need. Every part of me that had been hollow for years suddenly felt full, and it was overwhelming.

When the kiss ended, I kept my eyes closed, like maybe I could hold the moment longer that way.

“Go back to sleep,” Nico whispered.

I didn’t want to.

I wanted to ask a thousand questions. Wanted to confess things I hadn’t even told myself yet. Wanted to beg him to keep holding me until I believed I was worth it.

But I said nothing.

I just tucked my face into his chest, felt his fingers stroking my hair again, and let the weight of him beside me anchor me to something that felt real.