MasukRyanI waited for the disgust.I waited for the exact moment her heart would harden, for her to take a step back and look at me the way Amelia had at the river. A monster.I stood pinned against the freezing plaster of the hallway. My chest was heaving fast, bracing for the execution I absolutely deserved.But Mila didn’t flinch. She didn’t step back.The silence in the narrow corridor stretched out, thick and heavy with the sound of the rain lashing against the brick outside. She just looked at me. Her eyes traced the wet lines of my face, the exhaustion carved deep into my jaw, taking in the full, ugly weight of my confession.“Amelia…” She repeated softly. The name sounded completely foreign in her mouth.I closed my eyes, unable to bear watching her process it. “I am so sorry.” I rasped, the words feeling weak, like useless scraps of an apology.“Ryan…” She called quietly.I opened my eyes.Mila shook her head slightly. Not forgiveness. Correction. “You said you heard everything
MilaThe moment I heard the floorboard creak, every instinct inside me sharpened. I had laid Leo carefully into the playpen without even thinking about it.But the figure standing beyond Justin’s office wasn’t one of my father-in-law’s soldiers.It was Ryan.He stood motionless at the far end of the hallway, his back turned toward me. He looked like he had walked through a storm just to end up here.And somehow, he looked worse than the weather outside.It wasn’t just the soaked clothes or the cold clinging to him that made my chest tighten.It was his posture. The Ryan I knew never folded into himself. Even at his lowest, even when he was breaking, he still occupied space like he refused to be erased.But now his shoulders were drawn inward, as if he was trying to physically shrink out of existence. His hands were clenched at his sides. Like holding still was the only thing keeping him upright.He looked like a man standing in front of something he couldn’t survive.“Ryan?” I asked
RyanI belong to him.The words didn’t save me. They didn’t stitch the ruined pieces of my soul back together. They didn’t ease the pressure crushing my ribs or silence the endless noise clawing through my skull.If anything, they destroyed me completely.Mila didn’t just love me. That would have been easier to survive.She believed in me. Even after everything. Even after the lies, the violence, the disappearance, the struggle.She still looked at me like I was something worth surviving for.My chest tightened so violently it physically hurt to breathe.While she had spent the last year carrying our son, hiding in the shadows, mourning me like a ghost she refused to bury, I had surrendered.She had protected the memory of us with both hands. And I had tried to drown mine beneath whiskey, violence, and the body of another woman.A sudden wave of nausea slammed into me so hard my vision blurred at the edges.I caught myself against the cold plaster wall. My stomach twisted viciously. E
Mila“But…”I swallowed hard, but it still came out frayed around the edges, heavy with a guilt I no longer knew how to carry.A single hot tear slipped free, trailing slowly down my cheek before disappearing against the collar of my sweater.I tightened the faded flannel blanket around Leo, lowering my chin gently onto the top of his head. His tiny body was warm against my chest.“But…you can’t replace a wildfire with a hearth, Elena.” My voice trembled quietly in the dark office. “No matter how desperately you want to be warm.”The line went completely silent.It was the kind of silence that settles after someone finally says the thing they have been carrying for so long it has started living inside their bones.Outside, rain rattled softly against the boarded windows of the clubhouse.Inside, my entire world cracked open.“Aaron gave me a sanctuary…” I whispered at last. My throat tightened again. “He gave me peace.” I closed my eyes briefly before forcing the truth out anyway. “Bu
RyanThe ride back to the South Side passed in a blur of freezing rain, screaming engines and absolute emotional paralysis. I barely remembered the roads I took. The Ducati tore through slick midnight streets while icy water lashed against my face hard enough to sting. Neon signs bled across the wet pavement in distorted streaks of red and gold, the city reduced to fragments of light smeared across the darkness. But I didn’t feel the cold. My mind stayed trapped back at the overlook with Amelia standing in the rain, staring at me like she had finally seen the corpse underneath the designer suits and sharp smiles. You’re a monster. The worst part was that she hadn’t been wrong. By the time I turned into the alley behind the clubhouse, my clothes were soaked through completely. Rainwater dripped from my hair into my eyes as I killed the engine and let the sudden silence crash over me. The Ducati ticked softly as it cooled beside me. I sat there for a long moment, m
Mila“It’s Elena.”I forgot how to breathe.The sound of Elena’s voice hit me almost physically. One second, I was sitting in Justin’s dim office listening to the ticking wall clock and the distant groan of old pipes. The next, I was somewhere else entirely, back in that quiet high-rise house with lights I loved, clean floors, and people who had loved me gently instead of violently.“Elena?” I choked out. My grip tightened around the phone hard enough to make the plastic creak beneath my fingers. “How are you even calling me? This number—”“Aaron doesn’t know.” she interrupted quickly, lowering her voice into a frantic whisper.I could hear the muffled sound of a late-night television program somewhere behind her. Plates clinking faintly. The familiar hush of the house at night.“I took the burner from his desk while he was downstairs in a meeting.” she admitted. “I swear to God, Mila, if I didn’t hear your voice tonight, I was going to lose my mind.”Emotion clogged my throat so sud







