Page 62 of The Vagabond

MAXINE

M y phone rattles on the nightstand, the harsh buzz cutting through the silence without ceremony. It’s Tayana. Her voice rushes through the speaker — breathless, electric.

“Turn on the TV, Max.”

“Why?”

“ Just do it. I’m heading your way now.”

I fumble for the remote, fingers shaky, stomach knotted. The screen flickers to life. And the world explodes.

The footage is already everywhere — split across news channels, blasting through social feeds, stamped on every headline like a brand no one can scrub off.

Ninety seconds. That’s all it takes. Faces I recognize. Faces I don’t. The city’s most powerful — judges, politicians, executives, cops — their names are rattled off, their crimes laid bare, their sick smiles frozen on screens they’ll never escape.

Human trafficking. The cost. The fallout. It’s all there in plain sight for the world to see. In black and white. Sordid deals inked in blood. The Aviary is unravelling slowly, thread by crooked thread .

My stomach lurches. I press a hand to my mouth as the anchors scramble to catch up, their words tumbling over each other —

This just in —

Leaked footage —

Explosive revelations —

Massive arrests underway —

It’s chaos. Pure, beautiful, brutal chaos.

My chest heaves, sharp and unsteady, as the headlines scream from the television.

Every breath feels like a blade — cutting, scraping, raw.

There’s a hollow drumbeat in the back of my skull, this gnawing, rising panic.

What if they name me? What if my face flashes across that screen, caught in the endless loop of survivors, of victims, of broken girls turned into a public spectacle?

But…no. Nothing. There isn’t any hint of my involvement. My anonymity holds like a miracle, an invisible shield in a world that loves to tear survivors open and parade their scars.

Mason. The Gatti brothers. They did this — quietly, ruthlessly, efficiently.

When I was missing, they moved mountains to find me.

They turned the city inside out, scorched every lead, every name, every whisper.

But when they got me back? They didn’t let the world turn me into a headline.

They didn’t let me become “the girl who survived.” They buried my story so deep only they and the ones I chose to tell would ever know.

I swallow hard, throat tight, eyes stinging. I owe them everything for that, because my future will be free from prying eyes and curious glances. And now, even as the cameras blaze and the reporters howl, my name is still missing from the headlines.

But his name? His presence? God, Saxon. I whisper his name into the quiet like it’s a lifeline.

Saxon. Saxon. He kept his word. He told me he’d make them pay. He promised me justice — brutal, bloody, merciless—and here we are.

My hands shake as I press them to my face, a laugh breaking free, half-sob, half-shudder.

He did it. He’s the whistleblower. The hidden hand that ripped the Aviary apart at the seams and shoved their rotting truth into the light for the whole world to see.

He changed the narrative — rewrote the ending.

There’s no escape for the guilty, no matter who they are.

No one gets to hide behind money, or power, or badges, or blood.

Saxon North set the wolves loose on the men who thought they were untouchable. And for the first time in a long, long time, I believe in vengeance. I believe in fire. And I finally believe in him.

I stand frozen by the window, arms wrapped tight around myself as the news plays on a loop, the screen flickering with names, faces, ruined legacies.

The city is coming undone, and all I can think is — Saxon did this.

My knees threaten to give. The weight of it, the magnitude of what he’s risked, of what he’s torn apart, slams into me with brutal force.

And then the front door of Brando’s home bursts open.

Tayana, Jacklyn, and Allegra trail behind Mia — they sweep in like a storm, faces flushed, arms laden with bags, bottles, blankets. They don’t even wait for me to speak.

Tayana strides straight over and pulls me into a hug so tight I swear my ribs creak. “You didn’t think we were going to let you face this alone, did you?” she murmurs, her voice fierce against my ear.

I’m glad that they’re here, but I can’t help that little voice that flutters awake at the edge of my mind. Sophia. God, I wish she were here.

My twin. My other half. Her absence is a raw, endless wound.

I feel it as acutely as the blood strumming through my veins.

And tonight — tonight, when the world is breaking open, when the monsters are finally being dragged into the sun — I ache for her more than ever.

For the souls we lost. For the girls still trapped.

For the lives still waiting to be saved.

A tear slides down my cheek, hot and sharp, cutting a clean line through the noise inside me. This isn’t just a victory. It’s a promise. That we’ll keep fighting. That we’ll keep tearing down every cage, every chain, until there’s nothing left but freedom.

I close my eyes and whisper her name. Soft. Fierce. Unbreakable.

Then I turn back to the girls — the fierce, stubborn, fire-forged women who pulled me back from the edge more times than I can count. Tears prickle, sharp and sudden.

“I— I can’t believe this is happening,” I whisper.

Jacklyn snorts softly, wrapping an arm around my shoulders as she pulls me toward the couch. “We can help you there,” she teases. “Start with: Thank you, Saxon, for being the sexiest, bravest, most reckless son of a bitch out there. ”

I let out a laugh, shaky and half-choked. “Sexy?” I manage, voice breaking. “He just blew up his whole life…”

Allegra flops onto the couch, kicking off her heels with a dramatic sigh, eyes glittering with a knowing spark. “Exactly,” she smirks. “You’re obviously worth more to him than his whole damn career.”

Mia slides onto the armrest beside me, her expression soft, tender, but with that fierce glint of quiet pride that only a sister can carry. “He’s giving you your closure, sissy,” she murmurs gently, resting a hand on my shoulder. “Something that’s long overdue. ”

“That’s not his responsibility,” I remind her.

“No, it’s not,” she agrees softly, her voice edged with something fierce.

“But apparently, he’s decided to burn down the bastards who kept you from us for a year — the same monsters that still stalk your dreams and crawl through your nightmares.

” She leans in, eyes locked on mine, her words hitting like a slow, devastating blow.

“You must be very precious to him, Maxine. I hope you see that. I hope you feel it — because men don’t risk everything they are for just anyone. ”

I blink, once, twice — and then the world seems to tilt, just a little, just enough to make the air thin, my pulse sharp and wild in my throat. My chest tightens, a sharp ache blooming behind my ribs. I suck in a breath — but it’s shaky, fragile, because she’s right.

Oh God, she’s right.

Saxon didn’t just take down monsters. He didn’t just leak names.

He torched his career. He gambled his freedom.

He risked everything, not because it was his job, not because it was some noble quest — but because of me.

Because, somehow, in all this wreckage, he saw something in me that was worth setting the whole damn world on fire for.

A strangled sound escapes my throat — half sob, half laugh, raw and choked and messy. I press shaking hands to my mouth, eyes burning, heart pounding so hard I swear it’s going to crack my chest open from the inside.

“You once asked me what it’s like to survive a man like Brando…”

My breath catches, the memory slamming into me like a punch to the ribs.

I remember. I remember it so clearly.

“Do you remember what I told you?” Mia whispers.

I swallow hard, forcing the words past the knot in my throat. “ You told me… you live inside him.” I let out a shaky breath. “And I told you that would be terrifying.”

Mia smiles faintly, her eyes glimmering with something old and deep and unshakable.

“I can see how you’d feel that way.” Her voice softens, drops lower.

“But now you know what it’s like, don’t you?

” Her fingers squeeze my shoulder, grounding me as the weight of it sinks in.

“To have a man so obsessed with you, he’d do anything just to make you whole again. ”

Allegra leans in close, her voice dropping to a low, intimate hum near my ear.

“A man like that, Maxine…” she breathes, “he’s a keeper.”

Her lips curve into a sly, wicked grin.

Their words wrap around me like a net, tugging, tightening, pulling me into something I don’t know how to carry. I press a trembling hand to my mouth, a sound breaking free — something between a sob and a gasp, raw and guttural and shaking.

Again, Sophia crosses my mind. She’s always on my mind. I wish she were here to see this, to know that not every man is a monster. I wish she could see that sometimes — just sometimes — a man can love you so much it terrifies you.

I squeeze my eyes shut, body curling forward as the weight of it crushes me. This isn’t the light, fluttery love the books talk about. This is a devouring love. An unstoppable, merciless, unapologetic force.

And the scariest part? I know I’ll never come back from it. There’s no going back to the girl I was before Saxon North carved himself into my bones.

I am his now. And he…is mine.