Chapter 56
Claire’s POV
I woke up alone.
Which, given everything Vera had been through, was a red flag the size of a small country.
My hand reached across the sheets—still warm.
And then I heard it.
Shouting.
From the kitchen.
My heart dropped.
I bolted up, yanked on Vera’s hoodie, and practically flew down the hall.
Emilia was already there, storming out of her room, hair a mess, eyes wild. Valeria came out behind her, rubbing her face like this was somehow expected.
We met at the corner, exchanged one panicked glance, and rushed to the kitchen together.
And there—front and center—stood Vera.
Fully upright.
Half-dressed.
Holding a knife to Dani’s throat.
“What the fuck is happening?” I gasped.
Dani, wide-eyed and frozen, held her hands up like she was auditioning for hostage drama of the year.
Vera didn’t even flinch. “She snuck up on me.”
“She—what?”
“I was trying to make coffee,” Vera said, dead serious, the blade still inches from Dani’s neck, “and she sneaked up on me.”
“She lives here!” Emilia yelled.
“She walks loud,” Vera snapped.
Lucia stepped in calmly from the pantry, holding a bowl like this was just another Tuesday. “Vera, mi amor. She’s Emilia’s friend.”
Vera narrowed her eyes, still not moving. “Doesn’t give her the right to sneak up on a recovering war criminal.”
“Recovering war criminal?” Dani squeaked.
Valeria groaned and grabbed the edge of the counter like she was about to pass out. “I told you not to give her caffeine.”
“I haven’t had it yet,” Vera said. “I was trying. Then she appeared behind me like a damn ghost.”
I stepped forward, holding back a laugh and placing a hand on Vera’s arm. “Okay, John Wick, let’s put the knife down. Dani’s only dangerous if you insult her eyeliner.”
“She startled me,” Vera muttered, but slowly—reluctantly—lowered the knife.
Dani exhaled like she’d just escaped a Netflix limited series.
I took the knife from Vera like I was disarming a wild dog. “No more sharp objects before breakfast.”
“I was making coffee,” Vera grumbled. “You should be grateful I didn’t stab the espresso machine.”
“You tried to stab my friend,” Emilia snapped.
“Your friend came at me from behind.”
“She asked if you needed help,” Lucia argued.
Vera rolled her eyes and looked at me. “See what I deal with?” Then she scoffed. “As if I’d need help from someone wearing heels at 7 a.m.”
I smiled, grabbed her face, and kissed her cheek.
“Next time just scream like a normal person,” I said. “No stabbing people before breakfast.”
“So she can stab me after breakfast?” Dani said, horrified.
“I wouldn’t mind it,” Valeria added, arms crossed, tone completely unbothered.
Vera took the knife back from my hand and pointed it at Dani. “See? I knew I didn’t like you. My sister doesn’t like you.”
Dani took a step back, looking at me with pleading eyes.
“She wanted my girlfriend,” Valeria said, smirking.
“Val!” Emilia and I snapped in unison.
She was enjoying this way too much.
“Okay, you’re dead,” Vera said, stepping forward again.
“Okay, okay!! Let’s breathe,” I said, wrapping my arms around her from behind like she was a rabid raccoon in a hoodie.
“You’re crazy, just like your sister,” Dani muttered as she ran out of the kitchen.
Vera shrugged in my arms. “Not wrong.”
And honestly?
Yeah. She was definitely back.
Vera’s POV
Emilia’s house was... fine.
Clean. Bright. Safe.
It smelled like coffee and lavender, and someone always seemed to be baking something. The walls had art, the towels were folded, the windows let in too much light.
It was the kind of house people healed in.
The kind of house people like me didn’t belong in.
I didn’t say that out loud, of course. Especially not to Claire.
She looked happier here. Calmer. Like some part of her believed we might actually get to be something normal now. Like this life could hold us both if we just stayed still long enough.
So I smiled when she wrapped herself around me in bed.
I nodded when she told me to rest.
I even forced myself to eat whatever Lucia slid onto a plate—though I still didn’t trust Dani not to poison it.
But the truth was... it was hard.
Every time I reached for a drawer and found linen instead of a pistol, I felt unarmed.
Every time someone knocked gently instead of barging in, I flinched anyway.
Every time I looked around and realized no one here needed protecting, my hands twitched like they were waiting for orders that weren’t coming.
Valeria helped—more than she knew.
She hovered, pretending not to. Sat too close on the couch. Brought me black coffee without asking. Rolled her eyes like I was still her chaos to contain. It anchored me in a way nothing else did.
But even with her…
This place wasn’t mine.
This life wasn’t mine.
And the longer I stayed, the more I felt like a guest in my own skin.
Claire noticed something. I saw it in the way she watched me, quiet and thoughtful, her thumb brushing absent circles against my wrist like she was keeping time with a question she hadn’t asked yet.
I didn’t give her a reason to ask.
Because I didn’t want to hurt her.
Didn’t want her to think she wasn’t enough.
She was enough. She was everything.
But I didn’t know how to tell her I felt like a shadow in a house made of light.
So I kissed her when she got too close to the truth.
And I said I was fine when I wasn’t.
Because I’d rather break in silence than see her eyes fall the way they did when she thought I might be slipping again.
Claire’s POV
I didn’t say anything when I woke up and found her already sitting on the edge of the bed again—shoulders tense, staring at the floor like it owed her something.
She didn’t say anything either.
I just walked up behind her, kissed the back of her neck, and said quietly, “Get dressed.”
Her head tilted. “Why?”
“We’re going for a drive.”
She didn’t ask more. Just followed.
The silence in the car wasn’t heavy. It was thoughtful. She stared out the window the way she always did when she was thinking too loudly, fingers drumming lightly against her thigh.
I didn’t rush. Took the long route.
Let her breathe.
It wasn’t until we turned down the dirt road, the trees thickening around us, that she finally sat up straighter. I saw the flicker of recognition in her posture before she even said a word.
She looked at me.
“You brought me to the safehouse?”
I pulled the car into the clearing and put it in park. “Yeah.”
She blinked at me, confused. Guarded. “Why?”
I turned to face her, one hand still on the gearshift. “Because you’ve been pretending you’re okay when you’re not. And I get it, Vera. I do. Emilia’s place is quiet and warm and... not you.”
She didn’t say anything, but her jaw clenched just a little.
I kept going, voice steady but soft. “I don’t care where we stay. It doesn’t have to be bright. It doesn’t have to be soft. It just has to be you. Because I didn’t fall in love with a quiet life. I fell in love with you.”
Her eyes dropped to her lap, her hand flexing once against her thigh like she was trying to keep something from slipping.
“And if this is where you feel like yourself again,” I added, “then this is where we’ll be.”
She didn’t speak for a long moment.
Then she looked up—and I swear her eyes had softened in a way I’d only seen a handful of times before.
“You did all this... for me?”
I nodded.
She opened the door without another word.
And the second she stepped out into the gravel, voices rose from around the corner—sharp, loud, almost panicked.
“Holy shit!”
“Is that—?”
“Jefa?!”
And then they were running.
One by one, her crew emerged from wherever they’d been—behind trucks, from the garage, around the shed.
They surrounded her in seconds.
Loud. Laughing. Shouting. Slapping her shoulder. Hugging her like they couldn’t believe she was real.
I watched her face.
Shock first. Then something else. Something that looked a lot like home.
She didn’t smile, not fully—but her chest lifted differently. Like she could breathe again.
Like maybe, just maybe, this was what she needed all along.