Chapter 56
I don’t remember deciding to hold on to him.
I just do. My hand is fisted in the front of Cobra’s cut, fingers locked so tightly in the leather that my knuckles ache.
My other hand wraps around his wrist like it’s the only solid thing left in the world.
Every step up the stairs feels too long, too open, too far away from the ground, and if his arm wasn’t around my waist, I don’t know if my legs would keep working.
He slows without asking. He feels everything.
Every stumble. Every hitch in my breathing.
Every tiny tightening of my fingers against him like some desperate, terrified part of me is afraid he might vanish if I loosen my grip.
He doesn’t tell me to calm down. He doesn’t tell me I’m safe.
Not yet. Maybe he knows I’m not ready to believe words like that.
He just keeps me tucked against him, one arm locked around my waist, his body angled slightly in front of mine like even the hallway is something he has to stand between me and.
I press closer. I can’t help it. The loss of contact feels impossible. Physical. Like if there’s too much space between us, everything inside me will spill out before I’m ready. I can feel it there already, pushing hard behind my ribs, behind my throat, behind my eyes.
Fear. Grief. Shame. Relief. All of it packed too tightly inside my body. I held it in for the car ride. For Matteo. For the main room. For Logan and the women and the brothers who watched me come back like I was something fragile enough to shatter if anyone breathed wrong. But now it’s only him.
That terrifies me more than the room did.
Because I don’t have to hold it together with him.
Because he’ll let me break. And I don’t know if I’ll know how to stop once I start.
His room comes into view, and something inside me twists so sharply I almost make a sound.
The door. The hallway. The ordinary shape of a place that became mine before I understood I was allowed to have it.
Cobra opens the door and guides me inside. The second it closes behind us, the world shrinks. No main room. No eyes. No questions. No Matteo. No auction. No collar. Just this room. His room. Our room.
The air smells like leather and smoke and him.
His bed is there, rumpled from before everything changed.
My things are still where I left them. A brush near the dresser.
One of my shirts folded badly on the chair because Cobra folded it and he’s terrible at it.
My charger still plugged into the wall. Normal things.
Tiny things. Proof that I existed here before they took me.
Proof that some part of me was waiting to come back.
That’s what breaks me. Not the blood. Not the fear.
Not even the memory of Eli’s body hitting the floor.
A charger in the wall. A shirt on the chair. My life, paused.
I make a sound I don’t recognize.
Cobra turns instantly. His hands come to my waist, steadying me, his eyes moving over my face with that intense focus that usually makes me feel seen. Right now, it makes me fall apart. “Angel.” One word. Soft for him. Ragged.
I shake my head, but I don’t know what I’m denying.
The tears come so fast I can’t stop them.
One second they’re burning behind my eyes, and the next I’m crying so hard my whole body folds inward.
Ugly crying. Broken crying. The kind that steals air and bends your spine and makes sounds no one should ever have to hear from themselves.
Cobra pulls me into him immediately. No hesitation. No panic. His arms close around me, one hand spreading across my back, the other cradling the back of my head like he can hold the pieces of me together if he presses close enough.
I bury my face in his chest and sob. Not pretty.
Not controlled. Not the quiet tears I let fall when no one could see.
This is everything. It rips out of me so hard my knees weaken, and he catches me before I can drop.
He lowers us both to the edge of the bed, pulling me into his lap because apparently standing is no longer something I’m capable of doing.
I cling to him. My fingers dig into him. My face presses into his neck, and I cry until I can’t tell if I’m breathing or choking.
He doesn’t tell me to stop. He doesn’t tell me it’s okay. He knows better than that.
Nothing is okay.
His hand moves slowly up and down my back, firm and repetitive, grounding me in the only rhythm I can follow. “I’ve got you,” he says against my hair. “You’re here. You’re with me.”
I try to answer. I can’t. The words come out broken and useless. “I was so scared.”
His body goes still for half a second. Then his arms tighten. “I know.”
“I thought—” My breath catches hard. “I thought I’d never see you again.”
His hand slides up my spine and holds there. “I’m here.”
“They talked about me like I wasn’t even there,” I say, and now that I’ve started, I can’t stop.
The words come out in pieces, jagged and too fast. “Like I was something they were moving. Something they sold. They called me inventory. They put me under those lights and everyone was watching, and I couldn’t cry because I didn’t want them to have that too. ”
A low sound comes from his chest. Not a growl. Not quite. Something worse. Contained pain.
“I couldn’t stop thinking about Eli,” I whisper. “He was on the floor, and he looked at me before they shot him. He said he was sorry, Cobra. He was sorry, and he didn’t do anything wrong.” My voice breaks completely.
Cobra’s hand presses between my shoulder blades, holding me to him. “I know.”
“I feel dirty.” The words come out before I can stop them.
The room goes still. Not because he pulls away. Because he doesn’t. He holds me tighter, so immediately, so completely, that the shame flinches inside me.
“I know I didn’t do anything,” I rush out, panic rising again. “I know that in my head, but I feel it everywhere. I feel their eyes. Their hands. That room. The collar. I feel like they left something on me, and I can’t get it off.”
Cobra’s breathing changes. For the first time, he sounds like he doesn’t know what to do.
That should scare me. It doesn’t. It makes him feel more real.
His hand slides into my hair carefully, avoiding every place that might hurt, and he presses his mouth to the side of my head.
“I don’t know how to fix this,” he says.
His voice is rough. Honest. Almost broken.
“Violence I know. This…” He drags in a breath. “This is harder.”
Something in my chest twists. Because I know.
I know he would rather tear through a hundred men than sit here holding me while I fall apart.
Not because he doesn’t want to comfort me.
Because this kind of pain gives him no throat to close, no bones to break, no target to eliminate.
And still, he stays. Still, he holds me.
Still, he asks, “Tell me what you need.”
The question settles over me. Simple. Direct. No assumption. No demand. No control. Choice. He gives me choice.
That’s what makes the answer rise immediately. “I need to forget.”
His body goes rigid beneath me. Not rejecting. Bracing.
I pull back enough to look at him, my face wet, my breathing still uneven, my hands shaking against his chest. “I don’t mean forever,” I say quickly. “I know I can’t. I know it doesn’t work like that.” His eyes stay locked on mine. Dark. Focused. Waiting. “I need you,” I whisper.
His jaw flexes.
“I need your hands. Your voice. Your weight.” My throat tightens, but I force the rest out. “I need you to take it away for a little while. Replace them with you.”
The room goes silent. The kind of silence that has a heartbeat.
His eyes move over my face, and I see the war in him. Want. Fear. Reverence. Rage. Love. All of it at once. “You sure?” he asks.
The question is rough, almost painful.
I nod.
He doesn’t move yet. “Words, angel.”
My chest aches. Even now. Especially now.
He needs me present. He needs to know I’m choosing this.
“I’m sure,” I say. “I want you. Not because I’m trying to disappear. Because I need to feel like I’m myself again, and you’re the only person I trust with that.”
Something in him breaks. Not violently. Quietly. His hand comes up to cup my face, thumb brushing beneath my eye. “You’re you,” he says. “Always.”
A sob catches in my throat again, but softer this time.
Then his voice drops. “And you’re mine because you choose it. Not because anyone forced it.”
I nod again.
His forehead rests against mine. “I’ve got you.”
“I know.”
“No,” he says, firmer. “Hear me. I’ve got you. You say stop, I stop. You say slow, I slow. You say nothing, I check anyway. Understood?”
My heart squeezes. “Yes.”
He kisses me then. Not hard. Not like the first time. This kiss is slow enough to hurt, careful enough to undo me in a different way. His mouth moves over mine like he’s reminding me of every place love can be gentle without being weak.
I melt into him. Not because the pain disappears. Because for the first time since they took me, something else is stronger. Him. Us. My choice. His hand slides down my back, steady and warm, and I follow the movement, letting myself feel it instead of flinch from it.
This is Cobra. Not them.
Cobra.
The man who waits. The man who asks. The man who would burn the world but holds me like I’m something sacred when it matters.
He lays me back slowly, keeping his body over mine but not trapping me.
His weight is there, grounding, present, exactly what I asked for, but his eyes don’t leave my face. “You’re safe,” he says.
I inhale.
His hand touches my cheek. “You’re here.”
Another breath.
His mouth brushes my temple. “You’re mine.”
My eyes close. Not from fear. From relief.
“Say it,” he murmurs.
“I’m yours.”
His breath shudders. And then he kisses me again.
The rest unfolds slowly, fiercely, painfully tender in places and intense in others, each touch replacing a memory I didn’t want with one I chose. He keeps talking to me, voice low and steady, grounding me when my breath catches, asking without making it feel like I have to perform strength.
When my hands shake, he covers them with his.
When I go still, he stops until I look at him.
When tears spill again, he kisses them from my skin like they don’t scare him.
Nothing about him is careless.
Nothing about him is taking.
Even when the heat builds, even when the need sharpens, even when the possessive edge in him rises and wraps around us both, it is anchored in devotion.
In love. In the truth that he is replacing fear with himself because I asked him to.
Because I trust him to. And somewhere in the middle of it, I stop feeling like my body is a place they touched.
I start feeling like my body is mine. Held by him. Chosen by me. Loved. Afterward, I’m emptied out in every possible way. My body is exhausted. My throat aches from crying. My eyes feel swollen, and my limbs are heavy in a way that has nothing to do with restraints anymore.
Cobra holds me against him, my head tucked beneath his chin, one arm around my back, the other low across my waist. His hand moves slowly against my skin, a steady stroke that keeps me anchored even now.
I don’t know how much time passes. Minutes. Hours. It doesn’t matter. The room is quiet again, but not like before. This quiet is different. Safe. Real. I listen to his heartbeat. Strong. Steady.
Mine.
My fingers rest against his chest, and for the first time since the auction, I don’t feel like I’m trying to claw my way back into myself. I’m here. With him.
Cobra doesn’t sleep.
I can tell.
His body is too alert beneath mine. Too watchful. But he stays still for me. Stays warm. Stays wrapped around me like he’s a wall the world can’t get through.
I press my lips lightly to his chest. “Thank you,” I whisper.
His arm tightens. “Don’t thank me for loving you.”
My eyes burn again, but this time it doesn’t hurt the same. I close them. His mouth brushes my hair.
No one touches me again.
He doesn’t say it out loud. He doesn’t have to.
I feel it in the way he holds me. In the way his breathing never fully slows. In the way his body stays ready even while mine finally gives in to rest.
No one touches me again.
Ever.