ログインRyanRyanI gave a distracted nod and walked toward the alley exit before the weight inside my ribs crushed me alive.Five minutes later, I was flying down the wet midnight streets of the South Side on my Ducati.The engine screamed beneath me as I tore through red lights and empty intersections without slowing once.I wasn’t wearing a helmet. I wanted the freezing wind against my skin. I wanted the rain hitting my face hard enough to sting.Why can’t it be like before?The city blurred around me in streaks of neon and rain-slick pavement. Headlights smeared across the wet road like bleeding stars. My tires hissed against standing water as I leaned hard into corners far too fast for sanity.But I didn’t care.I needed motion. Needed noise. Needed speed violent enough to outrun the version of myself I couldn’t stand looking at anymore.For nearly an hour, I rode aimlessly.Downtown. The docks. Industrial backroads along the river.I barely registered where I was going.All I knew was
Chapter 41: The Non-Aggression PactIreneThere is a specific stone ledge overlooking the Tiber River that almost nobody knows about.It sits just far enough away from the chaos near Ponte Sisto that the tourists thin out completely after sunset. No couples taking blurry photos. No loud university students spilling beer onto the pavement. Just the steady rush of black water beneath the bridge and the occasional distant hum of a Vespa somewhere deeper in Trastevere.It was my emergency exit.My decompression chamber.My leave me the hell alone location.Thursday night found me exactly where I wanted to be: completely off-grid.I had a sweating bottle of Peroni balanced against my knee, a half-finished slice of cold mushroom pizza resting on top of the bakery box beside me, and a carefully curated playlist blasting through my headphones that contained absolutely no tragic Italian opera.I hadn’t answered work emails.I hadn’t told Alessia where I was.I hadn’t even looked at my phone in
IreneBy 6:00 PM on Tuesday, I had successfully formatted three commercial zoning permits, finalized the CAD renderings for a boutique hotel in Milan and managed to go an entire eight hours without thinking about the Galante family.It was a personal best.I was currently packing my tote bag when Luca dropped a stack of blueprints onto my desk. Luca was one of the junior architects. He had a nice smile, wore a lot of navy blue, and possessed exactly zero brooding, tragic billionaire tendencies. He was safe. He was normal."Tell me you are escaping this hellhole." Luca said, leaning against my cubicle wall. "Because if Signor Bianchi asks me to revise the lobby dimensions one more time, I am throwing my monitor out the window.""I am officially off the clock." I confirmed, slinging my bag over my shoulder.Luca smiled, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose. "Good. Then let me buy you dinner. There is a new Sicilian place around the corner. Carbohydrates and wine. No spreadshee
MilaI had gone toward the back door intending to find them, but I stopped the moment my fingers touched the cold metal handle.The heavy iron door was cracked open only a few inches, and through the narrow gap, the damp night air slipped inside in slow, ghostly currents. It carried the sharp scent of rain-soaked asphalt, stale tobacco, and something far heavier than either of them—raw, bleeding vulnerability.I froze in the darkness of the hallway.The clubhouse behind me was quiet except for the distant hum of the old refrigerator and the soft static buzz of the neon beer signs flickering above the empty bar. But outside, under the dripping fire escape, the two men who had once seemed larger than life sounded devastatingly human.I should have walked away.Instead, I stayed hidden beside the door, my breath shallow, listening to the fractured pieces of my life speak to each other through the rain.I heard Justin shift first, the scrape of his boot against wet concrete rough in the s
RyanI stared out into the rain. Thought about Leo’s sleepy breaths against my neck. Thought about the softness of his forehead beneath my lips earlier that morning. Thought about the terrifying realization that I would burn entire cities to ash before I let anything touch him.“It feels…” I stopped, struggling for the words. Nothing in my life had prepared me for this.“It feels like your heart is walking around outside your body.” I added finally and laughed once under my breath, exhausted and disbelieving. “It’s the first time in my life I have ever been afraid to die. Not because I am scared of death. I stopped being scared of that a long time ago.”I looked over at Justin. “But because if I am gone…” My throat tightened. “I can’t stand between him and the things waiting to hurt him.”Justin nodded once. “Good.”Rain fell steadily around us while somewhere down the block a siren wailed faintly through the city.And beneath everything else, beneath the exhaustion, the grief, the ni
Ryan“You are still breathing too loud. It’s annoying.” Justin didn’t bother looking at me when he said it.He just leaned one shoulder against the rusted fire escape in the alley behind the clubhouse, cigarette balanced between two scarred fingers.The rainwater dripped steadily from the metal stairs above us. For the first time in seven days, I had stepped outside the hallway.Outside the office. Outside the invisible perimeter I had built around Mila and Leo like a man trying to hold back an avalanche with his bare hands.I took a slow drag from my cigarette, letting the smoke burn through my lungs.“I am trying.” I muttered finally.“Try harder.” Justin flicked ash onto the pavement without looking at me.The words weren’t cruel. That was the problem. They were tired. Heavy. Weighted down by a year of funerals, betrayals, blood, and all the things we never said out loud because men like us were taught to survive instead of speak.He finally turned his head toward me then, dark e







