Chapter 28
Jo-Leigh
I wake up the next morning alone in bed.
For a second, I don’t move. Can’t. My body aches everywhere.
There are bruises blooming across my hips, my thighs, my neck.
Where his hands didn’t leave marks, his mouth did.
Where his mouth didn’t, his teeth found me.
I drag my fingers over one of them without meaning to, pressing into the tender skin at my throat.
It stings, sharp and electric, and I hiss through my teeth, but I don’t stop touching it.
Because the truth is, the pain makes it real.
It wasn’t a dream.
The water pounding down. His hand at my throat. The way he said my name like a curse and a prayer all at once. The way he took and didn’t ask and how I let him. Wanted him. Craved every brutal, burning second of it.
I swallow hard, trying to shake the memory, but it clings like his scent on my sheets, stubborn and wild.
And then the guilt hits.
Because last night wasn’t supposed to happen. Not like that. Not when everything’s this messy and this dangerous.
I swing my legs off the bed, but when my feet hit the floor, my thighs protest, shaky and sore, and I have to steady myself against the nightstand.
My reflection in the mirror catches my eye and I let out a bitter laugh.
My hair is tangled, lips swollen, and skin streaked with faint, dark shadows where he branded me.
Jesus.
I close my eyes, but it’s worse because I see him. The wild heat in his eyes. The growl in his throat. The promise in every brutal thrust.
“You’re mine.”
The words echo in my mind in the quiet of the room, and I hate how much my pulse stutters remembering them.
But before I can spiral any deeper, there’s movement outside.
Voices. A door slams somewhere down the hall.
Boots heavy against the wood floors, purposeful, unyielding.
The door opens and Swag comes in, a dark scowl etched across his handsome face.
“Good morning.”
“Good morning,” he mutters, though it doesn’t sound like one.
He goes straight to the closet, yanking out a bag without even looking at me, tossing it on the floor.
“Swag?”
“I’ve got to go.”
The words land heavy with no explanation and no warmth. My pulse kicks hard.
“Go? Go where?”
He doesn’t pause. Doesn’t even glance at me as he starts shoving clothes into the bag.
“To New York.”
“New York?” I echo, my voice soft but sharp, the edges cutting me on the way out. “Now? You’re just leaving?”
“I don’t have a choice,” he snaps, finally looking at me but the fire in his eyes isn’t the same one that burned last night. This one’s colder. Harder.
Something twists deep in my chest.
“You didn’t think maybe I deserved to know before you—” I gesture to the bag, to him, to everything unraveling between us. “Before this?”
His jaw tics, tight, and for a second I think he’s going to answer, but he just zips the bag shut like that’s final.
“Don’t do this right now, little bee.”
That nickname stings worse than if he’d yelled.
“After last night,” I whisper, my throat tight, “you’re just gonna walk out without even telling me why? To go back to her ?”
The question hangs there like smoke between us.
He freezes in the doorway, shoulders locked, knuckles bone-white where they grip the strap of his bag. Every muscle in his body goes taut, like I just hit a nerve deep enough to bleed. For a heartbeat, I think he’ll turn around. That he’ll fight for this. That he’ll fight for me .
But he doesn’t. He doesn’t explain. Doesn’t deny it. Doesn’t do a goddamn thing except breathe like he’s holding something dangerous in his chest.
When he finally speaks, his voice is low, clipped, and sharp enough to cut skin. “I’ll see you in a few days.”
It’s not an answer. It’s a dismissal. And it breaks something in me I didn’t even realize was fragile. Before I can make sense of it, he’s gone, the door slamming hard enough to rattle the frame, the sound echoing in the quiet room like a gunshot.
I just stand there, frozen, the room heavy with the wreckage he left behind. My skin still aches everywhere he touched me, where he branded me with his hands, his mouth, his teeth — a roadmap of last night’s desperation inked in bruises and bites.
And now he’s gone.
The heat from him is still in the sheets. His scent still clings to my skin. But I’m alone, and I have no idea if the man who claimed me like I was oxygen, and he was drowning is ever coming back. I try to breathe, but my chest feels tight, the silence swallowing me whole.
Then, faint, muffled through the walls, I hear his voice downstairs.
The same tone that used to mean trouble was coming and blood was about to spill.
It hits me like a sucker punch to the gut.
He’s not leaving because of business. He’s leaving because of her .
My throat burns, and suddenly, I can’t swallow.
After all this time he still isn’t over her.
Maybe he never was. Maybe he never will be.
Hot tears blur my vision, spilling over as I stand frozen in the same spot, one hand clutching the sheet against my chest like it can hold me together when everything inside me is splitting apart.
I pray for him to come back through that door.
To tell me I’m wrong. To tell me it’s me, it’s always been me.
But he doesn’t.
The hallway stays silent, the heavy echo of the slammed door still hanging in the air.
My legs feel numb, unsteady, like the floor might give out beneath me.
I force them to move anyway, one step and then another, until I reach the bathroom.
I tear my gaze from the mirror and twist the shower on, needing something.
The water’s scalding, steam curling up fast, fogging the glass.
I step under the spray, hoping the heat will burn him off me, hoping the sting in my skin will erase his hands, his mouth, his scent.
It doesn’t.
It clings. Deeper than skin. Deeper than bruises. Like no matter how hard I scrub, I’ll never get clean of him.
And maybe that’s the cruelest part.
Because even if he’s halfway to New York, chasing ghosts he’ll never let go of, my body still remembers the way he looked at me last night. The way he broke me open and rebuilt me in the same breath.
My palms flatten against the cold tile as the tears mix with the water, and I try — God, I try — to pretend the sound of the pounding spray is loud enough to drown out the truth clawing at my ribs.
He marked me like I was his.
And left me here like I was nothing.
Three days go by with nothing. No calls.
No texts. Not even a sign he’s breathing the same air as me.
The clubhouse is a ghost town like everyone knows something I don’t.
I catch glimpses of Pretty Boy now and then, always in motion, always avoiding my eyes, like he doesn’t want me to ask questions he doesn’t want to answer.
By the third day, I can’t take it anymore.
I find myself standing outside his room, knuckles hovering in hesitation before I finally force them down.
The knock sounds small, uneven, like even I’m not sure I want the answer.
There’s a beat of quiet, muffled music behind the door, and then it creaks open.
Pretty Boy leans against the frame, shoulders tense, jaw set. His blond hair’s damp, curling at the ends like he just got out of the shower, but his eyes pin me instantly, and they’re harder than usual. Guarded.
“You’re not supposed to be here,” he says flatly, filling the doorway like a barricade.
I swallow, fingers curling against the hem of my shirt.
“I just…” My voice falters, thinner than I want it to be. “I needed to know if you’ve heard from him.”
Something flickers in his expression, fast, but I catch it anyway. He schools it quickly, leaning one arm against the frame like he’s trying too hard to look relaxed.
“You should leave, Jo-Leigh,” he says quietly, softer this time, but it’s not comfort. It’s a warning. “This isn’t where you want to be right now.”
“Pretty Boy,” I breathe, shaking my head. “Please. Just tell me if he’s okay. If he’s?—”
“Stop.” His tone sharpens, cutting me off clean, and his hand comes up to grip the doorframe, knuckles white. For a second, it looks like he might slam the door, but then he lowers his voice, leaning closer so no one passing by would hear. “You don’t wanna know where he is.”
The words land like a gut punch, hot and cold all at once, and my stomach twists so hard I think I might be sick.
“Is he with her?” My voice breaks before I can bite the question back, raw and pathetic and too loud in the silence stretching between us.
Pretty Boy closes his eyes like I just kicked him, rubbing a hand over his jaw, but he doesn’t answer. And that’s answer enough. My chest caves in, breath ragged as the weight of it sinks deep, heavier than anything Swag left behind.
He finally looks back at me, sharp and restless, and for the first time, I see something unspoken in his expression. Guilt. Regret. Maybe even pity.
“Go back to your room, Jo-Leigh,” he says finally, low and rough. “Lock the door. Stay outta sight.”
“Why?” I whisper.
His gaze cuts down the hall before returning to me, tense and wary. “Because I hate seeing you like this.”
Then, before I can push, before I can breathe, he shuts the door. Hard. I ball my hand into a fist and knock again. And again. Louder this time, my chest tight, my voice rough when I finally speak.
“I have nothing else to do, Pretty Boy,” I warn him, loud enough to carry but low enough I don’t wake the whole clubhouse. “I’ll stand out here all damn day.”
There’s a pause, a muffled curse, and then the door yanks open. Before I can react, he grabs my wrist and pulls me inside, shutting it behind me fast enough to rattle the frame.