Chapter 31
Leaving Turin to come here felt like a risk from the start—a reckless, probably desperate, but necessary risk.
There was every chance she’d slam the door in my face, tell me to disappear and block me from her life for good.
But seeing the way her face folded in on itself, knowing I caused that, hurts more than any knife or bullet ever has.
I stand there, breathing hard, eyes fixed on the wood grain as if it might split and let me in.
She’d disappeared into the bathroom—said she needed a minute—at least ten minutes ago.
My hand hangs half-raised, curled into a fist I don’t remember making.
If I were a decent man, I’d walk away. Give her the space she thinks she wants.
Let her breathe without me crowding the air.
But there isn’t time for that. Not anymore.
“Lily.” I rap my knuckle against the door.
“Fuck off, Matt.” Her answer is immediate and sharp enough to cut.
I knock again. “Please. Five minutes. You can yell, hell you can throw things. But let me talk.”
Silence stretches. The door creaks open just enough for her to peek out, jaw tight, chin tilted up.
Her eyes are red-rimmed even as they glare at me; she’s defiant, utterly wrecked, still in her dress, hair loose and wild.
I forget how to breathe. Lily has always been beautiful, but this version of her—fierce, and confident in her own skin—is breathtaking.
Seeing her free to bloom away from Jen’s venom is just another thing I’m kicking myself for missing.
She steps through, bringing the chill of her silence with her. She leans against the frame like a warning—one wrong move and she’ll shove the door open and disappear.
“I want to make things right.” My voice comes out softer than I intended.
“In five minutes?” she laughs, bitter and raw. “What are you now, a magician?”
Her voice trembles as she continues. “Jonathan publicly denounced me. The whole Points—every one of those bastards—turned on me, like I was complicit. And you think five minutes is enough to fix that?”
As much as now is not the time, I have to bite back a laugh at her sass.
“No. But it’s a start.”
She lets out a sound that could be a laugh or a sob.
“A start? Matt, they don’t need a start.
They need proof. They need—” She breaks off, fingers digging into her palms until the knuckles blanch, and I worry she’ll break one of her pink studded acrylics.
My chest tightens. I should be able to fix this, but I feel useless watching her tear herself apart. “They need me gone.”
Seeing her like this rips something open in me. Every instinct screams to fix it, to strip this pain from her, to free her from the weight she should never have been forced to bear.
“I know how this looks, and I know it’s not going to be easy. But I didn’t—”
“You didn’t what?” She challenges. “You didn’t tell them the truth? You didn’t stand up for me?”
Heat flares at the injustice of it. “I did what I had to do to keep you safe.”
She laughs, short and incredulous, throwing her hands up as she paces the length of the room. “Keep me safe? By leaving me without a single guard and resorting to stalking?”
Every word lands like a blade, and I can’t take a single step toward her without feeling the weight of all I’ve failed to do.
She’s right to be furious, and a part of me wants to shove the truth between us and make her hear it all at once, but how can I even begin to explain something I don’t fully understand myself?
Right now, I’m still running on theories and suspicions, and hell knows that won’t be enough to hold up.
“I’m not asking for forgiveness,” I repeat slowly. “I’m asking for a chance to explain. To show you what’s been going on and what the real risks are.”
Her laugh dies. The defiance thins, replaced by a raw, brittle exhaustion. For a heartbeat, she’s not a shielded, furious woman, she’s someone who’s been hollowed out, and I’m the culprit.
“You have a lot to explain,” she finally whispers.
“I know,” I say. “And I’ll tell you everything you want to know if you’ll let me.”
She studies me like she’s weighing a wager. “So much has happened, so much hurt.” Her voice shatters. “Do you think I can just let you in after that?”
My mouth goes dry. There are things I can’t say—not yet—not until I can put the pieces in order without hurting her more. But the look on her face makes me reckless.
“I’ll prove it,” I say, raw. “If I have to bulldoze every person in my path, I will.”
Her laugh is low, almost a sob. “You say that now. But words are easy.”
“I know.” The admission tastes like both defeat and hope. “But I’m ready to do the hard part if you’ll let me.”
She looks away, swallowed by the hush of the room. “This is bullshit, Matt.”
“This distance between us is bullshit. Not being able to hold you, that’s bullshit,” I say, closing the gap until I can see the fine lines around her eyes, the subtle tremor of her mouth. “But I’m not giving up.”
For a moment, she’s silent, and I let the quiet press between us. It’s fragile—like one wrong move will shatter it—but it’s something.
“You don’t get to tell me what to feel,” she says finally, voice low but steady. “But if you’re serious about this—about us—then you start by telling me everything. No half-truths. No omissions.”
“Everything,” I vow knowing this is make or break.
She exhales—a small, almost imperceptible surrender—then gestures to one of the chairs at the tiny two-top by the window, her movements measured, deliberate. She perches on the foot of the bed, spine straight, eyes locked on me. “Start talking. Don’t stop until I tell you to.”
It’s a surrender without surrender, an invitation tempered with steel. She’s letting me in but on her terms. And God help me, I’ll take it however she’ll give it.
Following her lead, I take a seat, and for the first time since I walked in, I feel a sliver of something that might be hope.
For a long moment, I can’t speak. The silence between us hangs like judgment—hers, mine, the world’s.
How do I even begin to unpack all the half-truths and tangled secrets that divide us?
“You think I let them exile you because I didn’t care,” I start, voice rough, and ragged. “That I just stood there and watched it happen.”
Her eyes flash, wet and furious. She doesn’t deny it.
“I didn’t,” I say, sharper now. God, she has to believe this. “When I found out about Jen—what she was doing, who she was connected to—I thought my world had cracked open. I wanted it to be a lie. I needed it to be. Because how could the woman who raised you…?”
The words choke off. I see the muscle in her jaw twitch, the way she holds herself together by threads.
“I went to Belfast with Bren. Not to dig up dirt on you—God, no—but to find anything that could prove you weren’t involved.
That you were innocent. I wanted proof, Lily.
I wanted to drag it out, lay it bare so the world couldn’t touch you.
I swear to you, sweetheart, that was all I wanted.
The whole damn reason I got on that plane. ”
Her hands tighten, fisting the sheets between whitening knuckles. Her lips part, but she doesn’t speak, instead waiting for me to continue.
“We followed the leads we had and found more than enough to damn her—emails, bank statements, photos. Enough to bury her.” My chest tightens at the memory. “But the problem was, it was also enough to damn everyone around her.”
I swallow hard.
“And then Bren found the emails between her and Benedict. Your father.” My voice roughens.
“Saw them calling you an asset. Talking about you feeding them leads. What the hell was I supposed to think?” A bitter breath leaves me.
“It felt like I was inheriting my Da’s curse—being used by the women he loved. ”
I shake my head slowly. “And I knew… if I spoke out, if I pushed too hard, they’d start asking the wrong questions. They’d figure us out. And then everything would explode.”
My voice drops, stripped bare. “Because with us—being stepsiblings, being family in their eyes, and the marriage contract already in play—it would’ve been a shitshow. They wouldn’t have listened to a word I said in your defence. They’d twist it. Say you manipulated me. That you played me.”
I look at her, pain cutting deep.
“I couldn’t let them do that, Lil’. I couldn’t let them stain you.” My throat tightens. “I couldn’t let them tarnish the one good thing I’ve ever known.”
Her breath shudders. I can’t tell if it’s anger, grief, or both.
“I was scared. And fear makes you see patterns that aren’t really there. It made me hesitate instead of fight. And then it was too late.”
My jaw tightens. “But the longer I watched you—the more I tracked your movements, your streams, your life—the less it added up. I kept digging into those emails, rereading them, cross-checking timelines, looking for proof.” A bitter laugh slips out.
“And I couldn’t reconcile it. The girl in those messages?
She doesn’t exist. She doesn’t match the woman sitting in front of me. ”
I swallow hard. “Then I found the word asset plastered across files tied to that damn ring. That’s when I realised how wrong I’d been, how I let fear blind me and destroy the one good thing in my life.”
I drag a hand down my face. “I thought silence was the best thing I could do for you.” The confession tastes like ash.
“I convinced myself that if I stayed quiet, the rumours around your exile would fade. That you’d be safer if I didn’t draw attention.
But all it did was leave you alone to carry the weight of sins that were never yours and vulnerable. ”
Her breath shakes.