Page 18

The first thing I notice when I wake is the scent. It’s everywhere. In the air, soaked into the sheets, etched into the oversized t-shirt clinging to my skin. It’s masculine, dark, and clean... something that smells too much like comfort and danger all wrapped into one.

It smells like him. Like Ares. A scent I’m becoming dangerously addicted to.

My head throbs, a slow, dull pounding behind my eyes. I blink up at the high ceiling, confusion swirling thick in my chest. It takes me a minute to piece everything together, the club, the bathroom, the cold water. I can still feel the chill in my bones.

Ares.

He saved me again .

The room is empty now. No sign of him. No deep voice calling me Bambina. No handsome face scowling at me. No strong arms around me. The only proof he was even here is the scent clinging to my skin like a memory I don’t know how to let go of.

I push myself up slowly, the world tilting slightly before it evens out.

My bare legs swing over the side of the bed and touch the cool wooden floor.

The t-shirt I’m wearing, far too big for me, brushes mid-thigh.

I gather the hem in my fists, grounding myself with the feel of it, before forcing my legs to move.

I shuffle toward the door and out into the hall. The manor is eerily silent, the thick walls muffling whatever life is stirring beyond them. I wander aimlessly for a minute before one of the housemaids rounds a corner and spots me.

She offers a soft, polite smile and a little bow of her head. “Buongiorno, Miss Windslow,” she says in a thick accent, “Mr Russo is in the gym.”

The gym. Of course he is.

I murmur a quiet thank you and follow her vague wave down a hallway I haven’t been down before. My bare feet are silent against the marble as I move, heart hammering against my ribs harder with each step.

When I find the door, it’s slightly ajar, a low, rhythmic thud leaking out into the corridor. I push it open further and step inside.

There he is. Topless, drenched in sweat, muscles rippling as he drives his fists into the heavy punching bag suspended from the ceiling.

His fists land hard, brutal, sending the bag swinging wildly with each hit.

His focus is absolute. His face carved from stone.

Like he’s exorcising something dark and bloody with every punch he throws.

I lean against the doorframe, unable to look away.

I should go. I should turn around and leave him to it.

But I don’t.

Because in that moment, watching him move, watching him fight whatever ghosts claw at him from the inside, it hits me...Ares Russo is just as broken as I am. Perhaps even more.

The sound of the punching bag shaking on its chains and swinging fills the gym, but somehow, even over that, he senses me.

Ares stiffens mid-swing, his fists dropping to his sides. Slowly, he turns, his chest rising and falling with sharp, controlled breaths. His dark eyes lock onto mine from across the room, and for a moment, neither of us moves.

The tension between us crackles in the air, every drop of oxygen feels like it’s been sucked out of the air. I should probably say something. I should turn around and leave. But his gaze grips me tight.

Instead, I drift further into the room, pulled toward him by something invisible and unstoppable.

As I get closer, my eyes drop to his body.

To the scars marring his tan skin. Slashes across his ribs, a brutal line curving along his abdomen, another just below his collarbone.

Marks of violence and survival. Marks of a life I can barely begin to imagine.

Without thinking, I lift my hand, reaching toward the faded scar along his abdomen. A question is already forming on my lips. Who did this to you? How did you survive this? When his hand shoots out. His fingers clamp around my wrist, firm but not painful, stopping me inches from touching him.

The sudden contact steals what little breath I have left from my lungs. His fingers are hot against my skin, rough and calloused, a stark contrast to the gentleness in the way he holds me back.

For a heartbeat, we just stare at each other.

Him...guarded and unreadable.

Me...wide open and raw.

His jaw flexes, tension rolling off him in waves.

“Don’t,” he warns, voice low and ragged, like it’s laced with something he’d rather not feel.

My chest aches at the wall he puts up, but I don’t pull away.

I don’t retreat like I should. Instead, I meet his stare and whisper, barely breathing, “Who hurt you?”

For a second, just a second, I swear something flickers behind those cold eyes.

Something human.

Something very broken.

But just as fast as it comes, it’s gone. Ares drops my wrist and steps back, severing the fragile thread between us. His impenetrable walls snap back into place so violently, I can almost feel them slam shut. “Go back upstairs, Jordyn,” he says, tone like steel.

He turns away before I can say anything else, snatching a towel from a bench and scrubbing it over his face and hair like I’m already forgotten.

But I’m not stupid.

He felt it too, he had to, how could he not?

Something in my chest sinks deeper in my gut as I turn and, without a word, slip out of the gym. Each step feels too loud against the polished floors, way too heavy. The air in the hall is cooler, crisper, but it does nothing to soothe the burn clawing at my chest.

I don’t know where I'm going. I just know I need to move.

Away from him. Away from the way his voice cracked when he told me no. Away from the ache blooming low in my stomach like something toxic.

I hug myself tighter, his oversized shirt swallowing me up, and force one foot in front of the other.

Left, right. Left, right.

My heart stays behind in that gym, wounded and bleeding all over the cracked concrete floor.

But my body? It moves forward.

Because what other choice do I have?

I don’t bother waiting for Ares to come back up. I change into my dress from the night before, grimacing as the damp fabric clings to my skin like a second, suffocating layer. The coldness seeps into my bones, chilling me from the inside out.

I don’t even know how I got undressed and wound up in one of his t-shirts, but I don’t even have the energy to think about it.

I catch sight of his T-shirt, the one I was just wearing, the one he must have pulled over me at some point, lying crumpled at the foot of the bed.

My chest squeezes in a way I don't want to examine too closely.

Gently, I pick it up, smoothing the creases before folding it neatly and placing it back on the bed.

It feels oddly final. Like sealing off a moment I’m not supposed to want to remember. Without another glance at the room, at the place that smells like him, feels like him, I pull open the door and slip out into the long, dim hallway.

My footsteps sound too loud against the marble floors. My heart even louder.

I need to get out of here. Before I do something stupid. Before I convince myself that this, that he, means something more than he ever will.

When I get back to the Russo Manor, I find Bianca in the sunroom, curled up in one of the massive window seats, flipping through a thick binder full of what looks like funeral arrangements and legal paperwork.

The second she sees me hovering in the doorway, her face tightens. I see worry, guilt and relief. All of it flashes through her too fast to catch properly.

She sets the binder down and quickly stands.

“Where the hell have you been, Jordyn?” she says, crossing the room fast, her voice breaking somewhere between angry and scared.

“I—” I don't even get a full word out before she throws her arms around me, pulling me into a tight, desperate hug.

“You scared the life out of me,” she mutters into my hair. “Jordyn, you can’t just keep disappearing on me like that.”

I don’t hug her back right away. Something inside me is still too raw, too fragile.

But then she pulls back enough to grab my face between her hands, forcing me to look at her. “Enzo told me what happened,” she says quietly. “The club. The drugs. Are you okay?”

Shame slices through me, hot and fast.

“I didn’t mean to—” I start, but she cuts me off.

“What were you thinking? You could’ve died, Jordyn,” she says, eyes shining with unshed tears. “Do you get that? You could’ve ended up like them. You could’ve been—” Her voice chokes off, and for a moment, neither of us moves.

“I know,” I whisper. “I’m sorry.”

“You’re sorry?” Bianca repeats, her voice breaking. “Jordyn, I know you’re devastated. I know you’re drowning in the loss of Mum and Dad... but so am I.” Tears fill her eyes, brimming until they spill over. “You’re not the only one who lost them, okay?”

The sting behind my eyelids is immediate and brutal.

“I know your grief, your trauma, is heavier than mine. You watched it happen. You were there...” She shakes her head, her chest heaving. “But I’m hurting too. And you’re all I have left, and I don’t know what the hell to do because it feels like I’m losing you too.”

Bianca’s words punch straight through the walls I’ve been trying to keep up. I stand there, frozen, the apology caught in my throat, the tears burning the backs of my eyes.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper again, but the words feel too small, too useless for the damage already done.

Bianca doesn’t say anything. She just stands there, broken and furious and desperate. And it hits me right then how selfish I’ve been in my pain. How I’ve been so busy drowning that I didn’t notice she’s been gasping for air too.

The next breath I take shudders through me, and then I’m moving. My arms wrap around her in a messy, desperate hug, clutching her to me like I’m afraid she might vanish if I let go. For a second, she stiffens, like she’s not sure if it’s real, and then she clings back just as fiercely.