Chapter 16
Chapter sixteen
Dante
I’m standing in the middle of a kitchenware shop in Central London, surrounded by things I don’t understand, while trying to find everything Dylan asked for.
Mixing bowls. Measuring cups. A whisk. It seemed simple when I first read the list. Now, faced with an entire wall of options in different sizes and materials and price points, I realize I have no idea what I’m doing.
The sales assistant approaches with a practiced smile. “Can I help you find something?”
“Baking supplies,” I say. “Everything someone would need to bake. Properly bake, not just...” I gesture vaguely. “Amateur stuff.”
Her eyebrows rise slightly, but she’s too professional to comment on the obvious disconnect between my appearance and my request. I’m aware of how I must look.
Dark clothes, hard face, the kind of presence that makes people cross to the other side of the street.
Not exactly the typical customer for a shop that sells pastel-colored stand mixers and cake tins shaped like flowers.
“Is this for yourself, or a gift?” she asks.
I hesitate. What is Dylan to me? Not a gift recipient. Not a friend. Not a... anything I have a word for.
“Someone I’m taking care of,” I say finally.
Something in my tone must convey more than I intended, because her expression softens. “Someone special, then. Let me show you our professional range.”
An hour later, I’m loading boxes into the back of my car.
A stand mixer in brushed steel, because Dylan said it would be amazing even though he could manage without one.
A complete set of mixing bowls in graduated sizes.
Measuring cups and spoons, both metric and imperial.
Whisks, wooden spoons, silicone spatulas.
Baking trays and cake tins and a muffin pan and something called a bundt tin that the sales assistant insisted was essential.
I also bought a kitchen scale. Digital, precise to the gram. Because Dylan said baking is all about precision.
The grocery shopping is easier. I have his second list, written in neat handwriting on a piece of paper I’ve been carrying in my pocket all morning, and it contains things I know and understand.
Things I’ve heard of before. Flour, sugar, butter, eggs.
The basics. But I also add things he didn’t ask for.
Fresh fruit. Vegetables. Proper meat from the butcher counter instead of the packaged stuff I usually buy.
If I’m going to feed him, I’m going to feed him well.
By the time I pull into the trading estate, the back of my car is full and my wallet is considerably lighter. I don’t care. The money means nothing. What matters is the look on Dylan’s face when he sees what I’ve brought.
I catch myself on that thought as I cut the engine.
When did his happiness start mattering so much to me? When did I start planning my days around his comfort, his recovery, his smile?
It’s dangerous. I know it’s dangerous. In my line of work, attachments are liabilities. People you care about become leverage, pressure points, weaknesses that enemies can exploit.
But Dylan isn’t leverage. He’s not a pressure point. He’s just... Dylan. Soft and sweet and so utterly out of place in my world that sometimes I forget he’s there against his will.
I shake my head and start unloading boxes.
It takes three trips to get everything inside. I stack the boxes in the kitchen, then go to the bedroom to tell Dylan they’ve arrived.
He’s sitting up in bed, reading a book I found in one of my cupboards.
Some old thriller from the eighties that I don’t remember buying.
He looks up when I enter, and I’m struck again by how much better he looks.
Color in his cheeks. Clarity in his eyes.
The haunted, hollow look that defined his first days here has faded into something softer.
“The supplies are here,” I say. “If you feel up to coming to see them.”
His face lights up.
It’s the only way to describe it. His whole expression transforms, brightening like the sun coming out from behind clouds. The change is so dramatic, so genuine, that something in my chest does a slow, painful flip.
“Really? You got everything?”
“Everything on your list. And some other things I thought might be useful.”
He’s already pushing back the covers, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. His movements are still careful, still measured, but there’s a strength and an eagerness to them that wasn’t there yesterday.
“Can I see? Right now?”
“That’s why I came to get you.”
He practically bounces out of bed, and I have to fight back a smile. He’s like a child on Christmas morning, all barely contained excitement and impatience. It’s endearing in a way that makes my chest ache.
I’ve never known anyone like him.
In my world, people are hard. They have to be. Survival demands it. Even the ones who seem soft have edges underneath, defenses honed by years of navigating violence and betrayal.
Dario’s boy, Molly. Sweet on the surface, charming and bright. But underneath that charm is a man who spent years as a sex worker, who learned to read people and situations with the precision of a predator. He knows exactly how dangerous the world is and has made his peace with it.
Nicolo’s fiance, Liam. Gentle and quiet, with those haunted eyes that speak of trauma I can only guess at. But he spent five years in prison. Five years surviving in an environment that breaks most men. Whatever softness he shows now was forged in fire.
And Carlo’s wife, Ginni. The most dangerous person I know, for all he likes to wear skirts and plan dinner parties. That boy has a darkness in him that even I find unsettling sometimes. A capacity for violence that rivals my own, wrapped in a package of delicate beauty and a soft voice.
They all have edges. They all have armor. They’ve all learned to protect themselves in a world that would destroy them otherwise.
But Dylan...
Dylan is different. Dylan is genuinely, uncomplicatedly soft. He apologizes when he bumps into furniture. He thanks me for every meal I bring him, even the terrible ones. He talks about his bakery with such love and passion that I can almost smell the bread rising.
He has no edges. No armor. No defenses at all except his kindness, which isn’t really a defense at all.
He shouldn’t exist in my world. He shouldn’t be able to survive here, in this place of blood and concrete and screaming.
And yet here he is. Not just surviving but somehow maintaining that impossible softness despite everything I’ve put him through.
It makes me want to protect him. Shield him. Keep him wrapped in cotton wool where nothing hard or sharp can ever touch him again.
Even though I’m the hardest, sharpest thing in his life right now.
We reach the kitchen, and Dylan stops in the doorway. His eyes go wide as he takes in the stack of boxes, the bags of groceries, the sheer volume of stuff I’ve brought home.
“Dante,” he breathes. “This is... you didn’t have to...”
“I wanted to.” The words come out rougher than I intended. “You said you wanted to bake. This is what you need to bake.”
He moves forward slowly, almost reverently, and starts opening boxes. The stand mixer first. He runs his fingers over the brushed steel surface, examines the attachments, makes a soft sound of approval that sends warmth flooding through my chest.
“This is a good one,” he says. “Professional quality. You didn’t have to spend this much.”
“You deserve good tools.”
He looks at me then, really looks at me, and something passes between us that I don’t have words for. Gratitude, maybe. Or something deeper. Something that makes the air feel thick and charged.
“Thank you,” he says softly. “I mean it. This is... no one has ever...”
He trails off, shaking his head. Then he turns back to the boxes and starts unpacking with renewed enthusiasm.
I watch him work. Watch the way his hands move with practiced efficiency as he organizes everything, sorting bowls by size, putting utensils into the bright yellow holder I bought.
His whole demeanor has changed. The nervous energy that usually defines him has settled into something calmer, more focused.
He’s in his element now, surrounded by the tools of his trade.
“This kitchen is tiny,” he says, more to himself than to me. “But I can make it work. If I organize properly, if I use the vertical space...” He trails off, already mentally rearranging.
“We could get shelves,” I offer. “Or one of those hanging rack things. For the pots and pans.”
He turns to look at me, and there’s that smile again. The one that makes something crack open in my chest.
“That would be perfect. Thank you, Dante.”
My name sounds different when he says it. Softer. Less like an accusation and more like... something else. Something I don’t let myself name.
“I should put the groceries away,” I say, because I need to do something with my hands before I do something stupid. Like reach out and touch him. Like pull him close and breathe in the scent of his hair. Like tell him all the things I’m starting to feel that I have no right to feel.
“I can help,” Dylan offers, already reaching for a bag.
We work together in the tiny galley kitchen, putting away groceries, organizing supplies. It’s cramped. We keep bumping into each other, apologizing, stepping aside. Every accidental touch sends sparks through my nervous system.
He doesn’t flinch anymore. I notice that somewhere between the flour going in the cupboard and the butter going in the fridge. When my arm brushes his, he doesn’t pull away. When I reach past him for a shelf, he doesn’t freeze up.
Progress. More progress than I have any right to hope for.
“I think I’ll start with something simple,” Dylan says, surveying his new domain with a critical eye. “Scones, maybe. They’re forgiving, and they don’t need to rise for hours. Plus, they’re best eaten warm, so we can have them with tea.”
We. He said we.
“I’ve never had homemade scones,” I admit.
Dylan stares at me like I’ve just confessed to a crime. “Never? Not once in your entire life?”
“I grew up in... unconventional circumstances. Home baking wasn’t really a priority.”
Something flickers across his face. Curiosity, maybe. Or sympathy. He doesn’t push, though, doesn’t ask the questions I can see forming behind his eyes.
“Well,” he says instead, “we’ll have to fix that. Tomorrow, I’ll make you scones. Proper ones, with clotted cream and jam. It’ll change your life.”
He’s teasing me. Gently, carefully, but definitely teasing. It’s such a normal thing to do, such an ordinary human interaction, that for a moment I forget where we are. Forget what I am. Forget that he’s here because I kidnapped him and tortured him and refuse to let him go.
For a moment, we’re just two people in a kitchen, talking about scones.
Then reality crashes back in, and I have to look away before he sees whatever is showing on my face.
“I should let you rest,” I say. “You’ve been on your feet too long.”
“I feel fine.” But even as he says it, I can see the fatigue creeping back into his features. The adrenaline of excitement is wearing off, leaving behind the bone-deep tiredness of a body still recovering.
“You feel fine now. You’ll feel terrible in an hour if you don’t rest.”
He sighs, but doesn’t argue. “Okay. Fine. But tomorrow...”
“Tomorrow you’ll make scones. I promise.”
That smile again. Warm and genuine and utterly devastating.
“It’s a date,” he says, and then immediately blushes at his own words. “I mean... not a date. Obviously. Just... a plan. An appointment. A...”
“I know what you meant,” I say, and I can hear the amusement in my own voice. Amusement. When was the last time anyone made me feel amused?
I walk him back to the bedroom and wait while he settles into bed. He’s asleep almost before his head hits the pillow, exhaustion finally winning out over excitement.
I stand in the doorway for a long moment, watching him sleep. The rise and fall of his chest. The way his hair falls across his forehead. The peaceful expression on his face, so different from the terror that defined his first days here.
Something is happening to me. Something I don’t understand and can’t control. Something that feels like falling, except I’ve never fallen before and I don’t know what waits at the bottom.
I’ve spent my whole life building walls. Learning to be hard, cold, impenetrable. Emotion is weakness. Connection is vulnerability. Care about nothing, and nothing can be used against you.
Dylan is dismantling those walls one smile at a time. One thank you at a time. One brush of fingers against my arm at a time.
And the terrifying thing is, I’m letting him.
I close the bedroom door quietly and retreat to the living room. To the horrible orange sofa that’s become my bed. To the silence and the solitude that used to feel like safety and now just feels like absence.
Tomorrow he’ll make scones. Tomorrow we’ll sit together and eat something he created with his own hands, in a kitchen I stocked for him, with equipment I bought because I wanted to see him smile.
Tomorrow I’ll fall a little further.
And I still won’t be able to stop myself.