Chapter 13 – Noa
We return to the estate in silence. The ride is brief, stifling, the friction between us concentrated and gnawing.
Matías doesn’t look at me. Not once. His fingers drum against his thigh, eyes trained to the wayside, looking off into the distance, his mind in some place I can’t reach.
Maybe he’s still in that cathedral, hearing the cartel elders question his authority.
Maybe he’s still seeing the surveillance photos of me sitting across from Renata, their grainy edges a stark accusation. Maybe he’s somewhere else entirely.
Either way, he is gone.
When we pull up to the front doors, he steps out without looking back. Doesn’t open the door for me. Doesn’t say a word. Just stalks inside, the doors yawning open to swallow him whole. The guards stationed at the entrance don’t react as I pass, their eyes cast downward.
My limbs feel like they belong to someone else, full of quicksilver, shackles for me to drag around.
I drag them upstairs, cutting the now-familiar path to my bedroom that stretches longer than it is.
My body spasms from the prolonged clench of every muscle.
It’s taken its toll on me: the confrontation with Matías, the condemnation of the elders, the way he had looked at me before leaving that cathedral—like I was the bane of his existence.
I start toward our bedroom, the familiar path rising before me, long and dimly lit, a corridor I’ve come to associate with retreat, not rest. My steps slow halfway there.
Something in me buckles—not from fear, not from exhaustion, but from the oppressive weight of unfinished words.
I don’t want to go back to that room. Not like this.
Not with everything unspoken still hanging between us.
I stop in my tracks. My fists curl at my sides.
No. Not this time.
I pivot, turning down the corridor that leads to the den.
My feet move on instinct, driven by the sharp ache in my chest that only he can answer to.
The hallway is quiet, save for the soft tread of my steps against the tiled floor.
As I approach, I hear the subtle clink of glass—he’s already poured himself a drink.
When I step into the doorway, I see him. He stands with his back to me, sleeves rolled up, shoulders stiff, one hand curled around a crystal glass. The decanter sits on the table beside him, the amber liquid catching the lamplight.
Before he can lift it to his mouth, I cross the room in quick, quiet steps and take the glass from his hand. I throw it back before he can, without thinking at all. A horrible idea, in retrospect, when I’m coughing over the burn a second later.
He blinks, caught off guard, eyes snapping to mine. He almost looks like he’s about to laugh, if only he weren’t so shocked. I seize the moment while I’ve got it.
"Please," I say softly, putting the glass back down like I could’ve done in the first place. My hands catch his, trying to cradle the backs of his massive hands—trying to keep him in my orbit, so he stops leaving, just for a moment. "Please, just talk to me. We’re fighting and you’re furious with me, and I think you’re unreasonable…
But.” He doesn’t cut me off, but I pause, like I’m waiting for him to do just that.
All he does is stare at me. While it isn’t exactly encouraging, it isn’t forbidding either.
“I know I shouldn’t have yelled at them, I was—I just didn’t think you deserved to be degraded like that." My throat constricts. "I’m your wife. If I don’t stand up for you, who will?"
"I'm not insane," Matías grumbles, the edge in his voice dulled by exhaustion rather than irritation.
I sigh, tug at his hands and stepping backwards.
“Sit with me,” I plead. He resists for a heartbeat, then relents, letting me guide him toward the buttery leather couch nestled beneath the tall windows.
I sink onto the couch first and pull him down beside me, close enough that our knees touch.
He sits stiffly, arms braced on his thighs, head bowed slightly like the weight of everything refuses to leave his shoulders.
"Yes, you are. You can be very cruel. You’re controlling and vindictive and manipulative. You’re very defensive," I say gently. "But you saw your brother killed in front of you. You get to be insane."
He huffs a humorless breath, eyes flicking to the shadows dancing on the wall.
“Look at me, Matías.” I steal his hand once more.
"You just don’t get to deal with it alone.
I’ve tied my life to yours. Remember?" I raise my palm, the cut still visible, a thin, raw line etched in my skin.
A living scar of a vow that no one forced me to make. A choice I stepped into with open eyes.
His gaze drops to it, lingering. Then, silently, he lifts his own hand and presses it to mine—scar to scar, palm to palm. The heat of him seeps into me, grounding, anchoring. The matching wounds burn with a quiet ache I wasn’t expecting.
"You were going to bind your life to his," he says quietly, voice frayed around the edges. "Instead you’re stuck with this."
I don’t pull away. I don’t even flinch. I don’t dare to make any sudden movements when he’s unveiling his underbelly. This is difficult for him. He thinks the scar matters. He thinks I see it as a fracture, a fault line, something that makes him less.
He doesn’t know.
"I can hate you for fleeing in secret," he adds, softer now, "but I can’t pretend a part of me doesn’t fucking understand it too."
All I can do is look at him, the hurt simmering quietly in my chest, not because of what he said—but because I find myself terrified that he’s never going to believe otherwise. Is this why? Is this why he keeps running away from me?
I shift closer, my hand still pressed against his.
The lines of our scars aligned, joined. The tension between us isn’t sharp anymore; it’s magnetic, curling like smoke beneath our skin.
He doesn’t move when I sink to my knees on the rug, then position myself between his legs, my hands resting lightly on his thighs, one remaining laced with his.
His body stiffens beneath my touch. He stares down at me, eyes dark, uncertain.
Then he barks out a harsh laugh—callous and abrasive, indignant in its force. "Because you pity me?" he snaps, venom curling through his words. "Don’t you fucking dare, Noa."
Now I see through his snapping. It doesn’t stop me from reaching for him, sliding my hand along his jaw, leaning forward to kiss him—softly molding my mouth to his. I drag my lips over his. My breath quivers, but I don’t let it halt me.
Gingerly, I guide his hand into the waistband of my jeans, pressing it to the heat of me with purpose, with need. "Does it feel like I pity you, Matías?" I whisper against his mouth. "Or does it feel like I am very, very attracted to you?"
His breath catches. A low groan slips from him before he can stop it, muffled into my mouth as I kiss him deeper, fiercer. His fingers flex where I’ve guided them, stroking me through my panties in slow, involuntary movements. The heat of his hand, the barely-there friction, makes my pulse stutter.
But then I laugh—a soft, breathy giggle that escapes without warning, bubbling out as my hips rear back, slipping just out of his reach.
His hand jerks slightly, startled by the sudden distance, and I don’t miss the way his body tenses, the way he shifts beneath me. He’s hard already. Just from that. Just from the feel of me. From knowing I want him.
I bow my head, dipping low to nuzzle at the thick line of him through his trousers. My breath warms the fabric, and I hear the sharp inhale he doesn’t mean to make. I let my lips brush him through the material, a teasing press, a promise.
"You’re very attracted to me too, aren’t you?" I murmur, voice low, teasing, velvet-wrapped steel.
His answer is written all over the taut line of his body, the way his hand tightens on my shoulder, the way his hips jerk just slightly toward my mouth.
I feel him twitch beneath my mouth, the tension in his body coiled like a spring, barely contained.
My hands work at his belt, unfastening it with care, my fingers grazing the firm line of him through his briefs.
His breath grows shallower, harsher, chest rising and falling with anticipation.
When I finally free him, he’s heavy in my hand, thick and hot, pulsing with a need that vibrates through every inch of him.
Matías growls low in his throat, one hand finding the back of my head, threading through my hair with possessive urgency. "Don’t tease," he rasps, voice rough around the edges. "You started this."
I don’t intend to tease.
I lean in, letting my tongue trail along the head of him, a slow, languid stroke that earns me a sharp inhale from above.
I trace the sensitive underside, circling the crown with delicate flicks before taking him into my mouth, inch by inch, wrapping my lips around him.
The feel of him—hot, velvet skin over iron tension—fills my mouth, stretches my jaw.
He tastes of salt and heat and unspent desire.
His fingers tighten in my hair, not cruelly, but with a force that makes my scalp prickle, grounding me in the depth of his want.
He groans when I take more of him in, my throat opening as I push past the point of comfort.
I breathe through my nose, steady, focusing on the way he shudders beneath me, the way his hips twitch forward despite himself.
"Fuck, Noa," he grits out, his voice low and strained. "You don’t know what you’re doing to me."