Chapter 35 Jordan
JORDAN
The setting sun gives the sky a beautiful pink hue as I lean against the balcony railing of the master suite, bare feet planted on cool stone, letting the warm breeze hit my face.
Thirty whole days since Matei pulled me out of that thing and told me I was safe.
My fingers drift to my wrist, tracing the butterfly tattoo there.
The bruises are gone. The cut on my temple healed weeks ago, leaving only the faintest line that disappears under my hair.
The drugs flushed out of my system after seventy-two hours of hell: sweating, shaking, vomiting until there was nothing left inside me but rage and gratitude.
Matei stayed with me through all of it.
Even with his broken ribs, he held my hair back. He wiped my face with cool cloths. He refused to leave even when I screamed at him, even when I was delirious and told him I hated him for letting it happen in the first place.
He took it all.
And when the fever finally broke and I collapsed into his arms, sobbing apologies I didn't think he'd ever take, he kissed my forehead and told me I was the strongest woman he'd ever known.
I believe him now, finally.
The war is over.
That's what Adrian called it when he came here last week, still wearing tactical gear and smelling like gunpowder. The human trafficking ring that took me, that took Lindsey and God knows how many other women, is gone. Destroyed.
The boats were seized or sunk. The Bulgarians scattered like rats when Matei and his men started hunting them down one by one.
Some of them ran.
Most of them didn't make it far.
The ones who survived won't make the mistake of coming back to Los Angeles. Not after what Matei did to the men who put their hands on me. Not after the message he sent when he burned their warehouses to the ground, with men still inside, and stopped all imports of Siberian ice.
STURK Enterprise claimed they didn't know, but Matei says it's bullshit that needs to be addressed at a later date.
Adrian says Los Angeles belongs to the Ionescu family now, but Matei tells me in private that the real war with the Russians is coming. They won't be okay with losing out on all the money from selling drugs here.
I don't know. His world is still so foreign to me, but the one thing I do know now is that I unequivocally belong to Matei.
I don't even fight that truth anymore. I revel in it.
I inhale deeply, pulling the warm evening air into my lungs. Jasmine and lavender drift up from the garden below, mingling with the faint scent of chlorine from the pool. Somewhere in the distance, a gardener's trimmer buzzes, then falls silent.
Peace.
It's strange how quickly I've adjusted to it.
Strange how the silence doesn't scare me anymore. How LA doesn't scare me anymore.
I hear laughing, and I look down, past the main garden to the detached guest house tucked beneath a canopy of trees.
It's Lindsey.
She's sitting on the patio, her legs curled beneath her on one of the wicker chairs.
Her hair is pulled back in a messy bun, and she's wearing one of the oversized hoodies Matei bought her during our second shopping trip, the one where he dragged both of us to Rodeo Drive and told us to pick whatever we wanted.
She's starting to look healthy again. Not all skin and bones like before. She's clean, and most importantly, alive.
I refused to let Lindsey go back to the apartment even though she insisted she'd be alright.
We both knew better. Matei didn't protest in the slightest and even said she could live in the guest house.
His exact words were, "I protect you, and she is your best friend, so she falls under my protection, too. "
So that's exactly what she did. She moved into the guest house, and Matei made sure she had everything she needed. Doctors. Therapists. A detox plan supervised by the same medical team that helped me through withdrawal.
She quit Omnia too, of course. Told Taylor to go to hell when he called and tried to guilt her into coming back.
Now she wants to go back to school, finish her psychology degree so she can work with addiction survivors. Women like her. Women like the ones we were trapped with in that container.
I almost cried when she told me and Matei. I was so proud of her. It must have moved Matei as well, since he offered to pay for the whole thing.
I watch as Sorin steps onto the patio, carrying two bottles of sparkling water. He's one of Matei's guards, a good-looking guy.
Lindsey looks up at him and laughs at something he says. The sound carries across the lawn.
They look like teenagers, flirting over nothing and laughing over everything.
It's the first time I've seen Lindsey look truly happy since before all of this started. Before the club. Before the drugs. Before the men who took pieces of her every single night and left her hollow.
The sound of the sliding door opening pulls my attention away from them, and I turn.
"Hey, good-looking," I smile as Matei comes out onto the balcony. "Is it done?" I ask.
He comes up to me and kisses me. "It's done. The Bulgarian leaders are destroyed. Them and the trafficking is done."
"How many this time?"
"Fifteen." His voice is flat. "And nine women taken to the hospital."
They were the last of the Bulgarians who thought they could rebuild what Matei destroyed.
Fifteen more men who learned the hard way that crossing the Ionescu family means death.
"And Adrian," I say. "Was he right about it being the hub for everything?"
Matei leans against the railing, his forearms bracing his weight, and stares out at the estate. "Yes. It seems they had some kind of processing area where they would keep track of all the girls and who bought who." He stops and shakes his head. "It made me sick."
I rub his back, knowing how hard this must be to see the worst of humanity.
"Anyway, he stayed behind. Wanted to handle the final sweep himself. Check the office intel."
I nod, understanding. Adrian throws himself into the work. Into the violence. It's how he copes with the grief he still carries.
Matei shifts beside me, and I turn to look at him. The dying light catches the sharp lines of his face, softening the hard edges just enough to remind me that underneath the violence and the control and the ruthless precision, there's a man who holds me while I sleep.
A man who woke up sweating two nights ago from a nightmare he wouldn't tell me about.
"Come here," he says, his voice rough. "I want to talk about something else. Something happier that can't wait."
I step into his arms, full of curiosity and anticipation as he pulls me close, wrapping me in his warmth.
He rests his chin on top of my head and exhales slowly. "I conquered this city for us."
I close my eyes, pressing my cheek against his chest. His heartbeat is steady beneath my ear.
"But a kingdom needs a queen," he says.
I freeze.
My heart stutters, then races.
Matei pulls back just enough to look down at me, his hands sliding up to my face. His thumbs brush across my cheekbones, and his dark eyes search mine.
Then he reaches into his pocket and pulls out a small velvet box.
I stop breathing.
He opens it.
Inside, a diamond catches the last rays of sunlight. It's massive, easily five carats, maybe more, set in platinum with smaller stones flanking it on either side.
It's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.
Matei doesn't drop to one knee. He doesn't ask permission or stumble over pretty words.
He looks me in the eye and states it like a fact.
"Wear my ring. Take my name. Be mine in every way that matters."
My throat tightens. Tears burn behind my eyes, but I blink them back because I refuse to cry right now. Not when everything I've ever wanted is standing in front of me, offering me the world.
"Yes."
The word comes out easy because I've never been more certain of anything in my life.
No man has ever done for me what Matei has. No one has ever fought for me the way he did. No one has ever looked at me the way he does, like I'm something precious and dangerous and irreplaceable all at once.
He slides the ring onto my finger, and it fits perfectly.
Of course it does. Matei doesn't do anything halfway.
I stare down at my hand, at the diamond glittering against my skin, and something inside me shifts and locks into place.
This is real. He is mine.
Matei cups my jaw and tilts my face up, and then he kisses me.
It's not soft or gentle, but possessive. A brand that sears itself into my soul and marks me as his in every way.
I kiss him back just as hard, my hands fisting in his shirt, pulling him closer.
When he finally pulls away, we're both breathing hard.
His hand slides up, fingers wrapping gently around my throat, and heat pools low in my belly.
His lips curve into a slow smile. "Come to bed, fluture."
I follow him into the bedroom, my hand still tingling from the weight of the ring.
No longer a captive, but a willing partner.
His fluture. His queen.