Chapter 6 - Vera
The moment the front door closed behind Nico and that woman, something inside me shattered completely.
For several seconds, I remained exactly where I was.
Motionless and silent. I continued staring at the space he had occupied moments earlier.
I hated that my chest hurt. I hated that seeing him leave with another woman had affected me at all.
Most of all, I hated that he had seen exactly how much it hurt.
And he had enjoyed it. A bitter laugh escaped me.
I wasn’t na?ve enough to believe that he hadn’t been with anyone since I had broken up with him.
I knew Nico’s past rather well, and he had always been very active when it came to women and sexual relationships.
Love had never existed, but there was never a shortage of available women in his life.
Which only meant that after I had left, they must have returned, and Bianca was proof of that. What I didn’t know was that he was having dinner with them now before fucking them. It seemed as if I had at least managed to teach him manners during our relationship.
“Congratulations, Nico.” My voice sounded strange in the empty penthouse. “You finally got your revenge.”
I knew the pain I felt was nothing compared to the pain I had given him with my news of cheating, but it hurt just the same.
The silence that followed felt unbearable, so I turned abruptly and marched toward the hallway.
I needed distance, and I needed air. I needed something other than the image of a beautiful blonde woman touching him as if she belonged there.
The thought made fresh anger surge through me.
I wanted nothing more than to talk to Ava right now. Only she could calm me. But that was not possible.
I am not going to think about this. I am not going to think about this. I am not going to think about this.
I kept chanting the mantra in my head, forcing myself to think happy thoughts, but it felt rather impossible.
Without wasting any time, I quickly marched to my room and lay down, determined to go to sleep at once.
Although it only took me a few seconds to realize sleep was not going to come easily.
I kept thinking again and again about Nico and Bianca, and how he might be fucking her right now.
The very thought boiled my blood. Hours passed by, and I knew I needed to do something, anything, to feel better.
“Oh, Nico, you have woken up the devil inside me,” I whispered in the empty room and got out of bed with a determined plan in my mind.
By the time I reached his home office inside the house, I was practically vibrating with frustration. I shoved the door open, and the room greeted me with the same immaculate order it always maintained. Everything had its place, and everything was controlled and perfect.
Just like Nico.
The sight only made me angrier. I grabbed the first thing I saw, which was a pen holder, and threw it hard at the wall before me.
It hit the opposite wall with a satisfying crack, and pens scattered everywhere.
For a moment, I simply stared at the damage.
Then I grabbed something else and something else after that.
A file. A paperweight. A stack of reports.
They hit walls and floors with an increasingly violent force, but I didn’t care.
I was angry and definitely not afraid to show it.
My breathing became uneven. Hot, sharp, and definitely furious.
“You don’t get to do this,” I snapped at the empty room.
My voice echoed back at me.
“You don’t get to kidnap me.”
Another file flew.
“You don’t get to lock me in here.”
A notebook followed.
“You don’t get to disappear for days.”
The desk lamp narrowly missed a bookshelf.
“And you definitely do not get to parade another woman through your kitchen right in front of me, knowing fully well it is going to hurt me a lot!”
The lamp toppled onto its side with a loud thud.
I was surprised no one had shown up yet, asking about the ruckus I was creating, but the house was clearly asleep in the early hours of the morning.
The room looked considerably worse now. Good.
I hoped it got worse. I rounded the desk, and just then my gaze landed on the photograph.
I froze.
The picture rested partially beneath a folder.
It was me. I frowned and picked it up slowly, confused about how it had gotten there.
The image had clearly been taken from a distance.
I was standing outside a bookstore downtown with a coffee cup in one hand while my phone was in the other.
The angle looked wrong and rather unnatural.
Like whoever had taken it hadn’t wanted to be seen.
A strange feeling settled in my stomach, and I flipped the photograph over.
There was nothing at the back. My gaze shifted to the folder beneath it with my name scribbled on top.
Something felt off about this because I knew the picture had only been taken a couple of months ago. After Nico and I had already broken up.
“What is this?” I whispered to myself, almost scared of finding out more.
I opened the file, and the first page made no sense.
The second made even less sense, and by the third, my hands had started shaking.
Every single page outlined the date, time, and location again and again and again, explaining my whereabouts from just two weeks after the breakup until the day Nico had kidnapped me from my wedding.
“What the actual hell,” I whispered the words aloud, but the room offered no answers.
I turned another page, and my stomach dropped.
Monday.
Animal shelter fundraiser.
Arrival: 6:12 PM.
Departure: 8:41 PM.
Companion: Mila Reynolds.
I stared. I remembered that night perfectly. I turned another page.
Thursday.
Lunch meeting.
Brickell.
Arrival: 12:03 PM.
Departure: 1:17 PM.
Companion: Natalie Vance.
My pulse accelerated.
“Oh god, no.”
Saturday.
Bowling Alley.
Arena.
Arrival: 06:35 PM.
Departure: 11:24 PM.
Companion: Ava Malcom Lee.
I grabbed another folder. Then another. Then another. Every single one contained the same thing. Records, observations, notes, photographs. Pages and pages of information about my movements, my routines, and my life. A cold sensation crawled down my spine.
None of this was recent. This wasn’t something that started at the wedding.
It stretched back further. My hands trembled as I pulled another file free.
Inside was a photograph I recognized immediately.
I had been leaving work, and the weather had been terrible that day.
I remembered because it had ruined my shoes.
I looked at the date. The picture had been taken three weeks after our breakup.
He had started stalking me just three weeks after things ended between us. I stared at it and the dozens of other photographs scattered across the desk.
Then back again.
“Nico...”
The word escaped before I could stop it.
I kept opening folders, and the evidence continued.
Everywhere I looked, there I was. Leaving restaurants.
Entering buildings. Meeting friends. Running errands.
Planning that awful wedding. Living my life.
And somehow... Nico had known all of it.
A fresh wave of anger crashed through me.
This time it was different. Deeper. Sharper. Far more personal.
“He followed me for months!” The room remained silent, and I laughed, the sound bordering on hysterical. “This is insane. Oh god.”
Something finally snapped inside me, completely and irreversibly. I swept everything off the desk in one violent motion. Papers exploded across the room. Folders scattered and photographs floated toward the floor like confetti, but I barely noticed. The rage had become too large and consuming.
For the first time since arriving here, I felt marginally better.
I wasn’t happy or calm. Just better. I sank onto the sofa and waited for sleep to come, but it failed me once again.
I needed to do something else. Something more.
I needed to feel the sting of sweet revenge raging through me the way he had felt when he paraded with Bianca in front of me.
My gaze drifted toward the hallway, my mind going straight toward Nico’s room.
A dangerous idea began forming. It was not because I wanted forgiveness or peace.
I was done being passive. I was done waiting.
I was done allowing him to dictate every emotional battlefield between us.
I knew I had done the wrong thing by lying to him and breaking up with him and choosing to marry another man, but I had my reasons, and he was refusing to understand those reasons.
He wanted war.
Fine.
I could participate. I would give him war, and this time, he would be the one bleeding.
I rose from the couch, and my heartbeat accelerated immediately.
The hallway felt unusually quiet, and each step carried me closer.
The door stood slightly open with just a sliver of darkness visible beyond it.
I paused, realizing he must have come home sometime in the night.
I entered slowly, and the room was dim. Moonlight spilled across the floor while Nico occupied the large bed.
He was asleep for once. Actually asleep.
The sight hit harder than expected. I used to spend hours watching him sleep whenever he stayed the night, or I stayed the night with him.
I loved studying the patterns of his face and the slow, labored movement of his chest. It was the only time he was properly at peace.
I walked closer to him and looked at his handsome face.
The last six months had changed him. The sharpness remained.
The danger stayed. But exhaustion lingered beneath it now.
It was something heavier and older. I stood there for several seconds.
Watching and remembering, but hating myself for remembering.
Eventually, my attention shifted, and the idea that had taken root returned to me.
And once it did, it refused to leave. A slow smile touched my lips.
“Your turn to suffer, Romanov.”
The words emerged quietly like a challenge or a promise.
For days, I had been playing by his rules.
I had been scared of stepping over his feelings because I had constantly felt guilty, but that was ending tonight.
Because if Nico Romanov intended to make my life difficult, then he was about to discover I could be difficult too.
Very difficult.
I walked towards his walk-in closet and directly into the en-suite bathroom, which was made entirely of glass walls.
Without wasting another second, I stripped out of the pink pajamas I had on and walked inside the massive shower, knowing fully well what I needed to do.
I turned on the multiple overhead jet sprays, and a stream of warm water cascaded over me at once.
Stepping inside the bath, I laid down in a comfortable position, letting my body turn soaking wet while my fingers found my aching clit.
I hadn’t done this in forever, and suddenly the need to make myself come felt greater than the need to take revenge on Nico.
I rubbed my index finger slowly over my clit, the motion sending me into a different dimension of oblivion.
“Oh god,” I moaned softly, allowing my body to relax completely, sinking into the bath tiles.
I inserted my index and middle finger slowly inside me, the warmth and wetness of my pussy clinging to them.
I wanted to come at once, but I was also determined to prolong it.
I had to prolong it. After all, this was for Nico as much as it was for me.
I knew exactly what I needed to do to piss Nico off, and soon enough, he would wander into the shower and realize that pissing me off always came with consequences.