Chapter 19
Chapter Nineteen
Draco
My phone vibrates at six in the morning.
Charity’s curled against me in the narrow bed of our dog-friendly midtown hotel room, finally asleep after hours of crying and planning and trying to stitch herself back together.
Somewhere across the city, Lucky’s still at the emergency clinic recovering from surgery.
If everything goes well, we’ll be able to pick him up today.
And my phone will not shut up.
I ease out from under the blankets, careful not to bump her, and slip into the hall so the light and noise don’t wake her. Cheap carpet. Humming ice machine. Dim bulbs that make everything look like it’s been here forever. Anonymous, neutral ground.
No mansion. No cottage.
Just us.
Fifteen missed calls. Forty-two texts. Three voicemails. All from the last hour.
The first text is from Rurik:
Brother, you're everywhere. The ACTUAL news. Call when you can.
Then Alaric:
Fame found you. Your woman is WEALTHY. Good hunting, brother.
Then Flavius:
Reporters asking about you. I handled them with my usual charm and gave them exactly zero useful answers. Stay strong, brother. You're living the kind of story people only dream about.
I huff out something that’s almost a laugh. That’s Flavius—could charm a stone into dancing and still convince it the idea was its own.
I’m not laughing, though, when I pull up Google News.
The headlines explode across the screen:
HEIRESS WALKS AWAY FROM $500M FORTUNE FOR GLADIATOR BOYFRIENDCharity Pembroke Disowned After Choosing Ancient Roman Over FamilyLove or Manipulation? Inside the Pembroke–Gladiator Scandal
I click the first one.
There we are in frozen pixels—leaving the vet clinic, Charity pale and tear-streaked, my arm around her. Another shot of us at the diner, hands linked over Formica. Someone got close. Closer than they should’ve.
Maybe Charity was right. We should’ve grabbed the food and left.
The article is worse than the headline. They’ve dug into everything: my time at the Second Chance Sanctuary, the other gladiators, Laura.
They’ve got “sources close to the family” claiming Charity has been “acting erratic.” Amateur psychologists speculating about trauma bonding.
Cultural critics arguing about whether our relationship is exploitation—and they can’t even agree who’s exploiting whom.
Every nightmare I’d imagined, multiplied by a hundred.
My phone rings.
Laura.
“Tell me you’re okay,” she says. No hello, no small talk.
“I don’t know.” I lean against the wall opposite our door, pitching my voice down the hallway. “Have you seen—”
“All of it,” she says. “They’re calling me nonstop. They want statements, interviews, some kind of official confirmation that you’re real and not a stunt.”
“I’m sorry—”
“Don’t apologize.” Her tone softens but stays firm. “Draco, you didn’t ask for any of this. Neither did Charity. This is what happens when money and media and old power feel threatened. They start throwing knives and hope something sticks.”
“Her parents—"
“Are scared and furious and using the tools they have,” Laura says. “Influence. Press. Lawyers. You can’t control that. But you can control what you do next.”
“Do I need to worry about… anything beyond the press?” I ask quietly. “Researchers. Pharma people. Military. Anyone who sees me as something to dissect instead of a person.”
“No one’s contacted me,” she says immediately. “And I need you to tell me if they contact you. Promise me that.”
“They haven’t,” I say.
“Good.” I hear the breath she’s been holding. “Then this is just a public mess, not a private threat. Still brutal,” she adds. “But not the worst-case scenario. At least not yet.”
The hotel room door clicks open softly behind me.
I glance back. Charity’s in the doorway, barefoot, hair mussed, phone in hand, face pale.
“I have to go,” I murmur.
“Call me anytime. Day or night. I mean it.”
“I know. Thank you.”
I hang up and step back into the room.
Charity sinks onto the edge of the bed and stares at her screen like it might bite her.
“My mother called,” she says quietly. “Twice. My father three times. I didn’t answer.”
“Maybe you should—”
“No.” There’s steel under the hoarseness. “Not yet. Not when I’m this… raw. I need to think before I let them in again.”
I sit beside her, close enough to feel her shaking, not touching yet. We both scroll. Articles. Comment sections. Think pieces about money and power. Conspiracy theorists claiming I’m an actor. Others saying Charity’s having a mental breakdown live on the internet.
There’s an entire thread debating whether I’m her “project,” her “stray,” her “emotional support gladiator.”
My jaw tightens.
“They don’t know you,” she whispers. “They’re turning your whole life into a sideshow.”
“They’re doing the same to you,” I say. “Only their favorite word for you is na?ve.”
Her mouth twists. “That one stings more than ‘spoiled.’ Isn’t that funny?”
No part of this is funny.
“We could give an interview,” she says finally, voice small but determined. “Tell the truth. Our way. Control as much of the narrative as we can.”
“Would anyone believe us?” I ask. “That you didn’t walk away for headlines or rebellion, but because you chose your own life… and I happened to be in it?”
“I don’t know.” She sets the phone aside as if it suddenly weighs too much. “But hiding won’t fix it either. I spent my whole life hiding in plain sight. I’m done.”
I think about cameras. Lights. Questions designed not to reveal truth but to make good clips.
“What if we make it worse?” I ask. “What if everything we say gets twisted and used to hurt you?”
Her throat works. “What if it gets twisted and used to hurt you?”
We stare at each other, both of us breathing too fast, hearts not in sync.
My phone buzzes again. A new text.
SilverPoint Emergency Vet Clinic.
Lucky is ready for discharge! Come anytime after 2 pm to pick him up.
Something inside me unclenches.
“At least that’s good news,” Charity says, reading over my shoulder. Her voice wobbles on good.
“Yeah,” I say. “It is.”
“We can’t go in the front door,” she adds after a beat. “The reporters will stake out the clinic. If they haven’t already.”
“I’m sure they have,” I say grimly. “They may be vultures, but they’re not stupid.”
“We can’t leave him there,” she says. “Not after everything he’s already survived.”
“No.” I shake my head. “We won’t.”
I step back into the hallway to make the call.
SilverPoint is better at this than I expected—they’ve apparently dealt with “high-profile clients” before. They offer to bring Lucky to us in a clinic vehicle, and come through the back entrance of the hotel. No drama.
When I end the call and return, Charity’s chewing on her lower lip.
“Well?” she asks.
“They’ll bring him here,” I say. “To the hotel. Around five.”
Her shoulders drop a fraction. “He’ll be here. With us.”
“With us,” I confirm.
She looks around the tiny room like she’s seeing it for the first time: the duffel bags half unpacked, the stack of takeout containers on the dresser, the second bed we didn’t bother using because neither of us wanted distance last night.
“How long can we stay?” she asks quietly. “Realistically.”
“As long as we need to,” I say. “I paid for the next two nights when we checked in.”
Her eyes widen. “Draco—”
“I’m not letting you carry this alone.” I tip my head toward the small desk where my folded cash sits—what’s left from weeks of street performances and staying careful. “You’re not my patron. You’re my partner. We split things when we can. Hotel included.”
Her eyes shine. “I used some of my sculpture money,” she admits. “From pieces that sold before all this. I wanted to feel like I was contributing something that was mine.”
“You are,” I say. “You always were.”
Her laugh comes out watery. “So we’re both broke on purpose.”
“Not broke,” I say. “Invested.”
“In what?”
“In us,” I answer, before I can overthink it.
Her breath catches.
“By tonight,” she says softly, “we’ll have Lucky back. By tomorrow, there will be twice as many articles. Twice as much speculation.”
“Probably,” I agree.
“We can’t hide from it forever,” she whispers.
I study her — the woman who chose herself first and still somehow chose me anyway.
“No,” I breathe. “We can’t.”
Five o’clock ticks closer, promising us our dog back, one bright thing in a city full of shadows.
But love isn’t the bright thing right now. It’s the fragile thing — the one I don’t know how to protect.