Chapter 13 When The Light Hits The Ruin
WHEN THE LIGHT HITS THE RUIN
ZANE
Ihaven’t taken my eyes off her since she left my side.
So of course, I’m only half listening to the studio exec droning on about fuck-knows-what when I notice the man making a beeline for Ruby.
He carries himself with a careless confidence that irritates me on sight, the sort of swagger that comes from too much money and too little consequence.
His attention fixes on her across the room with an entitlement that sends hot lava through my bloodstream, and I watch him close the distance between them with a grin that already tells me everything I need to know.
He’s about to encroach on forbidden territory.
Sure as fuck the second he reaches her, he leans in far too close. Says something I can’t hear from across the room but I don’t need one of Mama’s crystal balls to guess. Because he opens his palm and reveals a small pill.
The noise in the room evaporates.
My focus narrows to the shape of her shoulders and the angle of his hand and the unmistakable intent in his smile, and I am already moving before the thought fully forms.
I cut through the crowd in a straight, brutal line.
People sway aside when they sense the tension radiating off me, and by the time Ruby has even processed the man’s offer, I have him pinned against the bar with my hand curled into his collar. The pill bounces across the marble surface and rolls under a stack of glasses.
“Are you offering drugs to my girl?” My voice is rough enough to scrape the air.
He blanches immediately.
He tries to sputter an excuse, but the words collapse in his throat. His fear hits me in a sharp wave, and I tighten my grip until he wheezes.
“N-no, man. I was j-just talking—”
“I don’t misinterpret people,” I say, my mouth close to his ear. “And I saw the pill, asshole. If you intended anything harmless, you would not be pissing yourself right now.”
Around us, the atmosphere shifts.
Conversations falter. Someone raises a phone. Freddie mutters something in frustration, but I barely register him. My entire attention remains locked on the man pinned beneath my hand and on the steady rise of Ruby’s breathing behind me.
She steps closer.
Her voice is soft but layered with tension. “Zane.” My name’s a hum from her chest. “Let him go.”
She is the only reason I even consider it, why I don’t drive my fist through his head.
But my body is still flooded with heat and the remnants of a storm that has no outlet.
The lights around us feel intrusive. The music presses against my skin.
Every instinct in me demands that I eliminate the threat completely.
So I lean harder over the fucker, bare my teeth in a feral smile that makes him greener around the gills. “You have five seconds to get the fuck out of my house. Or you’ll witness the true definition of motherfucking carnage.”
Small hands wrap around my bicep.
I turn to look at her.
Her cheeks are flushed from the tension. Her eyes are wide with a mixture of concern, embarrassment, and something else I can’t quite name.
Her dress shifts when she moves, and the sight sends another hard throb through my chest.
She’s the only thing in this room…in my life…worth protecting.
She is everything.
And she has no idea how far this already goes.
She doesn’t know about what I did in the bathroom in Vegas.
Doesn’t know about the pills I sabotaged.
Doesn’t know about the pack I intend to replace them with.
She doesn’t know how long I watched her sleep afterward, already planning the future she hasn’t agreed to but will live.
Her fertile window is looming like Christmas Fucking Day.
I have counted the days three times.
Once to confirm.
Once to savor it.
Once to imprint it on my memory and pray I hit jackpot the first time.
Breed Ruby Lane until she’s carrying my baby. The first of many.
I feel her hand close tighter around my bicep, apply a steady pressure that pulls me back into myself. For once, I’m glad she doesn’t hum. No other fucker in this place deserves to hear it.
Exhaling, I allow the tension in my fingers to ease. The man stumbles away, coughing and terrified.
I let him go, because my hands are meant for her and only her.
She’s still breathing hard. Still unsure of her place in this world I am dragging her into. She is still unaware of the ways I am anchoring her to me, one irreversible step at a time.
She has no idea how close she is to being mine in every possible sense, and she will not understand it fully until the moment her body carries proof of it.
By then, she will belong to me completely.
And she will realize it far too late to undo anything.
Ruby
The second Zane releases the guy, the room exhales amid a gust of whispers, cameras click, and poorly disguised stares ripping through the space.
Before anyone can swarm us, I grab Zane’s arm. “Hallway. Now.”
He doesn’t resist.
He follows me through a side door and into a narrow corridor, the music muted behind us, the shadows thicker, the air less lacquered with perfume and artificial charm.
The moment the door shuts, I whirl on him.
“What the hell was that?” My voice is a sharp whisper, fierce enough to snap.
He towers over me, chest rising too fast, hands flexing, jaw tight. His eyes haven’t fully come back down from whatever high-voltage storm was raging in him.
“Ruby, he tried to drug you.”
“No,” I bite out, “he offered something. I wasn’t going to take it.”
“You shouldn’t have to turn it down.”
“That’s not how the world works!”
“It is when you’re mine.”
My head jerks back. I feel the anger, fear, adrenaline, humiliation, every emotion crashing together in a dizzy rush.
“You don’t get to say that,” I hiss. “Not when you’re causing scenes at the biggest industry party of the year. Do you know how many cameras were on you? On me? Freddie is probably—”
“I don’t give a flying fuck about Freddie.” His voice is lower now. Rougher. Barely hanging on. “And neither should you.”
I shake my head. “Zane—”
“I saw his hand,” he says, stepping closer. “I saw your face. I saw the pill. Do you have any idea what could’ve happened if he had two more brain cells and decided to put that shit in your drink when you weren’t looking?”
His breathing turns frantic and uneven, clearly imagining a worse scenario even though the previous one is over. His fingers twitch at his sides and he looks back towards the terrace like he’s contemplating going back to inflict permanent damage on the guy.
And as I watch he glances up and down the hallway, at the lights that feel too bright even to me. He grips my arms suddenly and my heart lurches as his gaze jumps restlessly between my eyes, my lips, my neck, returning to my eyes as if anchoring himself there.
Another episode.
I see it rising. I see the energy pounding through him without direction.
I soften…just a fraction.
“Zane,” I say more quietly, “it’s okay. I’m okay. But…you can’t grab people by the throat every time you get overwhelmed.”
He swallows hard. “Then ground me.”
I blink. “What?”
“You know what that means.” The words scrape out, fractured. “My head is wired wrong tonight and everything feels too loud and too sharp and too close. You’re the only thing that—”
I don’t let him finish. I step into him and press my mouth to his.
He shudders. His hands fly to my waist, gripping tight enough to make my breath catch. He kisses me back like he’s trying to shove the chaos out of his body and into mine, kissing me deep, messy, hungry.
My back hits the hallway wall and his forehead presses to mine. Our breaths and our tongues tangle in the heat between us.
“More,” he whispers against my lips. “Please.”
I kiss him again. Longer. Slower. Anchoring.
His heartbeat begins to even out and his grip steadies.
His breath has just aligned with mine and he’s muttering, “Can I fuck you, baby? Please?” when the hallway door slams open.
“Zane.” Freddie’s voice cracks like a whip. “What the hell was that stunt in there—oh.” His eyes land on us. “Jesus. Again?”
Bishop appears behind him, hands raised in surrender. “We’re not judging, but you can’t strangle studio kids in public, man.”
King chimes in. “We have three sponsorship meetings tomorrow, man. Three.”
Jude adds, “Also, that guy might sue. And by ‘might,’ I mean ‘definitely will.’”
I groan.
Zane doesn’t turn around.
He keeps his body braced over mine, shielding me from view, breathing against my cheek like he’s still threading himself back into control.
Freddie rubs a hand down his face. “Zane, you can’t keep doing this. You can’t blow up every time someone breathes in Ruby’s direction.”
Zane finally turns his head, but only enough to look at Freddie over his shoulder. His voice is calm again. Too calm. “He offered her drugs.”
Freddie’s expression softens by a millimeter. “I get it. But you still can’t—”
“He offered her drugs,” Zane repeats, several octaves louder. “Maybe you should do your job and make sure fucking assholes like that don’t enter my presence. Or hers.”
And the hallway door shuts gently on Freddie’s incoming lecture, because Bishop drags him back by the elbow.
For a second, the world goes quiet again.
Just him.
Just me.
Just the thrum of danger still simmering under his skin.
“We need to go home,” I whisper.
He sighs. “I know. And we will,” he murmurs, resting his forehead to mine again. “Soon. But as much as I hate to say it, Freddie will have my balls on a string if I bail on the shoot and the tour.”
But there’s something in his voice that makes my pulse jump, something determined, heavy, resolute.
Something that whispers…he isn’t letting tonight go.
He isn’t letting me go.
And something is about to break.