CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE Breathe Me In
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Breathe Me In
I sat beside him in the car, wrapped in silence so thick it felt like drowning in fog.
The night outside was merciless, as was the man beside me. Moonless sky, like the moon itself, was swallowed by the darkness, or perhaps it had destroyed its own light. Streetlamps on the window, but I didn’t look at them. I didn’t look at anything at all.
I hadn’t uttered a single word since I stepped inside, and neither had he. Zagreus sat holding the phone in one hand and the other on my thigh, as if it was enough to tether me to this moment, to him altogether. His touch wasn’t as gentle as always. It wasn’t cruel, either, surprisingly.
The slit in my dress teased the pads of his thumb. Every pass, every absent-minded stroke felt deliberate. And I hated that my body noticed. Hated how my skin came alive beneath that subtle pressure. I sat perfectly still, hands folded in my lap, trying to pretend I wasn’t unravelling.
He was texting someone with his free hand.
And yet, I could feel him watching me.
Even when his eyes were on the glowing screen, I felt him watching. Admiringly, if I may say. Like he was cataloguing the way the shadows kissed my skin to how the bodice hugged my ribs a little too tightly. I hated the way his gaze felt like a secret I hadn’t agreed to keep.
A thousand thoughts screamed inside me, clawing to the surface, but my throat refused to open. I was terrified, utterly and literally, breathlessly terrified. Not just of him, but of everything. Of what I’d learned. Of what I hadn’t.
Of her.
My mother.
Alive and breathing.
The woman I’d cried for, prayed for, mourned for in lonely silence… she wasn’t dead. She had never been dead. She chose to disappear and leave me behind.
And suddenly, I didn’t know who to be angry at.
Zagreus told me. With that flat, cruel honesty only he possessed. She left me. She chose to vanish. And he was right. A person forgets the one who loved them in order to protect what they loved most.
She had forgotten me.
I tried to speak, but the words crumbled before they left my tongue. I seriously didn’t know where to start. Didn’t know how to ask the questions that had festered in my chest for years. Didn’t even know if I wanted the answers.
Was I so easy to abandon?
Was I so unlovable?
The heat of his palm was burning through the silk now, steadying me and grounding me in the most terrifying way.
I could feel the tension in my spine begging to snap.
I couldn’t even cry. The tears were struck behind some dam I’d built long ago, some inner wall that kept me from breaking completely in front of him.
But my heart was screaming.
It wanted answers.
It wanted her.
And somewhere, it was him too. Or maybe just the dark promise that came with him. The certainty that whatever nightmare came next, he’d be in it.
Maybe that’s what scared me most of all.
I was so engrossed in my own world that I didn’t notice the lights from streetlamps had turned into the full-blown city ones. The car began to slow as we entered the city area.
Lights flickered past the windows in dizzying streaks, neon signs, the flashes of traffic signals, and the occasional glow of the pedestrian’s phone. Civilisation. The closest I’d been to human life in… I didn’t know how many days. Maybe weeks. Maybe a lifetime.
And I was panicking.
My breath hitched, and my chest tightened. It started in the pit of my stomach, the nauseating pressure crawling up my spine. I wasn’t used to this anymore. I had forgotten the noise, the motion, the scent of fuel and concrete and life.
I had almost forgotten I was a painter.
An artist.
I used to love the chaos of crowds, the richness of movement, and the silent stories I’d capture in brushstrokes. But now? Now every shadow was unfamiliar. The city wasn’t familiar anymore. It was a monster with too many eyes and no mercy.
The car rolled to a slow stop, and before I could process it, the doors opened, the chauffeurs in crisp white uniforms, holding umbrellas, speaking rapid Italian.
And then the flashes. So many flashes, I almost went blind.
Camera shutters burst like flames, so bright and blinding white, exploding my vision.
I staggered back instinctively, eyes wide, lips parting on a silent gasp.
It was all too much. Too fast for my brain to register.
The world tilted on its axis, voices blurred, and I didn’t recognised being shouted at.
I couldn’t breathe.
A sharp ringing started in my ears. My heart thudded, slamming against my ribcage like it wanted out. My throat closed, and the edges of my vision started to dim. My lungs refused to fill.
Oh God, please, please, please, please…I can’t do this. I can’t breathe. I can’t live. I can’t… see.
When I thought I’d faint and fall, a strong hand wrapped around my waist with brutal certainty, yanking me into the solid heat of his chest. I collided with him, hands splaying across his suit, all silk and muscle and something darker underneath. Zagreus didn’t say a word.
But his touch devoured the chaos and the panic.
He leaned down, his nose grazing the shell of my ear, and his warm breath danced as he inhaled deeply like he needed it.
His palm at my waist slid lower, curving around my hip, pulling me tighter until not even air dared to exist between us.
His other hand ghosted over my nape, fingers tangling in the loose strands at the base of my neck. Anchoring me to him.
And gods, it worked.
The panic didn’t vanish, but it shifted; it became something molten, something more wicked that curled in my belly. I felt his mouth brush the side of my throat, and my hands trembled across his chest.
He held me tighter, his thumb slowly stroking along my hipbone like he was reminding me I was not going anywhere. Like he had me sorted.
And I hated that it calmed me.
Hated that I melted against him and let the warmth of his body became a sanctuary. That the tremble in my thighs wasn’t entirely fear anymore. That the flush creeping up my neck was heat, and not shame.
Lust and madness behind that impossible stillness.
His grip loosened slowly, like he knew exactly how I’d fall apart if he let go too fast. His hand lingered at my waist, thumb tracing idle circles through the fabric of my dress. His mouth was still closed, and the heat of his breath brushed my cheek.
“Don’t let them affect you, Dolcezza. You belong to the silence between my heartbeats, not their cameras. Let them chase your shadow, but only I… I can taste your fear and tame it.”
A shiver ran down my spine, curling my toes inside my heels, and the flashes continued. A few reporters called out my name, assuming maybe I was someone else. Or someone important to him.
“Mr. Vitale! Over here!”
“Who’s the girl?!”
“Is she your date?!”
But Zagreus didn’t look at them. He never broke eye contact with me.
His hand slid away, slow enough to burn.
And just like that, the armour returned, his face became blank marble, elegant and cold.
He stepped around me, letting the chauffeur open the door fully as if nothing had happened, as if he hadn’t just silenced my panic with a few whispered words and a single touch.
The reporters’ voices grew louder, more curious, but none dared to cross the velvet ropes.
I stepped out of the car. Legs shaking and eyes blinking against the onslaught of camera lights.
My fingers instinctively reached for him, just the air where he’d been seconds ago, and then he was there again. Walking beside me like a shadow with a pulse. Zagreus didn’t offer his arm, didn’t even touch me, but his presence alone pulled me to his gravity.
We entered the building, and the chaos buzzed in front of us.
Cold marble floors beneath the cathedral-high ceiling. Crystal chandeliers, dripping with light, danced above our heads. Velvet-lined walls, gold accents, and the distant sound of a cello echoing through the lobby.
And I… I was drowning all over again.
Not in panic, though, but in the sensation of not belonging.
I wasn’t dressed like the women we passed. They were tall and sharply painted to perfection. I wasn’t poised like them. Everything felt foreign. This wasn’t my world. It was just a place made of money and menace and masks.
I’d almost forgotten I was wearing a dress.
Forgotten the slit that revealed too much of my skin. Forgotten that Zagreus picked it up for me, and he liked it.
People turned to look at us. At me. I heard the whispers again. And all I wanted was to fade.
But Zagreus? He walked like he owned every inch of this place and everyone in it. And somehow… I started to remember how to breathe again.