Chapter 13
ISABELLA
T he glow from my phone screen painted the ceiling above me in soft, shifting light as I lay sprawled on the bed, one leg bent, the other lazily draped over the edge.
The fan spun lazily overhead, moving the thick Cartagena heat around but not doing much else.
My voice was quiet, not because I was tired, but because there was a heavy stillness inside me tonight. One I couldn’t shake.
Anna’s familiar face blinked in and out slightly on the FaceTime screen as the signal fought to hold.
Her long, silvery hair was down tonight, the kind of soft, gentle waves that reminded me of bedtime stories and warm tea.
She was in her kitchen, the same pale blue tiles behind her that I’d seen a hundred times.
Only tonight, something in her expression was… different.
“I couldn’t sleep,” she said softly, her fingers curled around a delicate mug. “Just felt… restless.”
I shifted the phone slightly on my chest and looked at her through the screen. “You? Restless? That’s a first.”
She smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “You always know when something’s off, don’t you?”
“I try,” I murmured, my voice low.
Anna looked at me like she could see every part of me—even the ones I’d carefully built walls around. That was the thing about her. She never pushed. Never asked questions I didn’t want to answer. She just existed like a presence I didn’t realize I’d needed until she was already in my life.
I wasn’t used to people like that.
We talked about small things after that.
Nothing heavy. The taste of the food here.
The sound of the waves from her side of the world.
The terrible playlist Yuri had insisted on blasting last night at the pool.
I didn’t mention Rafael. Not directly. Maybe because I didn’t know how to put into words the way his presence felt like a match held too close to dry skin.
I didn’t want to explain the bruise-shaped tension that lingered between us every time we spoke.
And I sure as hell didn’t want to hear someone else’s opinion about it.
Anna laughed softly at something I said—something about Ash and the way he was still too pretty for his own good—and I found myself smiling despite the storm cloud still trailing behind my thoughts.
Then came the knock. A sharp, firm rap against the door. Once. Twice. No hesitation.
My eyes flicked toward it immediately, pulse slowing in that strange way it did when your body knew before your brain did that something was shifting.
I sat up slowly, the phone still in my hand. “Hold on,” I told Anna, frowning. “Someone’s at the door.”
“Is it Kellan?” she asked gently, sipping her tea.
I shook my head. “He would’ve texted first. And he doesn’t knock like that.”
Something about the sound of it had lodged itself in my spine.
I pushed off the bed and padded barefoot toward the kitchen, setting my phone on the counter so the camera still faced me. Anna remained on screen, watching silently, her face unreadable now.
I moved to the door, my fingers brushing the knob as another knock echoed through the air. My thoughts swirled with quiet curiosity, the kind that always came before the fall.
The door swung open under my hand, and there he was. Blood soaked the sleeve of his shirt, the fabric sticking to his skin like it had been molded there. His collar was undone, the buttons askew, sweat glistening across his temple. He looked like war. Like sin wrapped in silk and sharpened steel.
And he didn’t even blink.
“Hope I’m not interrupting,” he rasped, his voice darker than usual. Rougher.
I couldn’t move. Not at first. Not with the sight of him in front of me—his jaw clenched, his body humming with the kind of tension that said if I touched him too hard, he’d break. Or maybe I would.
He brushed past me before I could respond, not waiting for permission. He didn’t need it. He never had. Not from me.
I closed the door with a quiet click and turned slowly, the air heavy, thick with something I couldn’t name yet. He was halfway into the living room when I finally spoke, my voice low. “What the hell happened to you?”
He started to say something, lips parting, but I cut him off. “Wait.”
I didn’t wait for a reaction. I spun around and rushed to the kitchen counter where I’d left my phone, fingers fumbling as I picked it up.
Anna had placed her phone down, the camera now facing the ceiling, soft sounds of her humming coming through the speakers.
She was back in her kitchen, moving about.
She hadn’t seen him. Hadn’t seen his face. Thank God.
Still, my pulse thrummed against my throat like it knew something I didn’t.
“I have to go,” I said quickly into the mic. “Talk later.”
I didn’t wait for her to respond. I hit the red button and watched the screen go dark. Then I turned around slowly, pressing the phone to the counter like it could anchor me.
He was sitting on the couch now, one arm slung over the backrest, the other resting on his thigh. His wound—though still bleeding—was mostly controlled, but I could see the strain on his features. The barely-there tremble in his fingers.
“You don’t look dead,” I said flatly, walking a few steps toward him. “Disappointing.”
He let out a low huff that might’ve been a laugh if it hadn’t sounded so jagged. “I figured,” he said. “That’s why I came.”
“You’re bleeding all over the couch.”
“Don’t worry,” he murmured. “It’s not the first time I’ve bled in silk.”
I stood there, arms crossed, trying to decide if I was more irritated at the blood or the man. “What the hell happened?”
He didn’t answer right away. Instead, he looked past me, his gaze flicking toward the counter. “Who were you talking to?” he asked, voice lower now. Curious. Controlled.
I held his stare. “None of your business.”
He tilted his head, studying me like he was reading a book only he had the code to. “Everything you do is my business.”
“That sounds a lot like control, Rafael,” I said quietly. “You should know how that ends.”
He smirked, but it didn’t quite meet his eyes. “You’d have to kill me first.”
“Don’t tempt me.”
The tension curled tight between us again—familiar, dark, threaded with too many things we hadn’t said. He sat there like a king bleeding on his throne, daring me to do something. To care. To leave. To stay.
“What happened?” I asked again, this time quieter.
His gaze dropped to his arm, then back to me. “Someone thought they could take what’s mine.”
“And?”
He smiled slowly. “I reminded them who the hell I am.”
I felt the heat crawl up my spine, not from fear—but from understanding. Because I would’ve done the same thing. Because I had.
“That person,” he said after a moment, nodding toward the phone, “was it someone you trust?”
I narrowed my eyes. “Why?”
“Because you looked at them like they were your anchor,” he said simply. “And people like us don’t get many of those.”
I hated that he wasn’t wrong. I hated that he could see it.
I walked past him without answering, heading to grab supplies for the wound. “Don’t get comfortable,” I said over my shoulder. “I’m only letting you bleed here because it’s better than letting you bleed on the street.”
“That’s the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me,” he muttered.
I didn’t look back. But I felt the shift in the air. The weight of everything he wasn’t saying. The things I didn’t want to ask. Yet.
I turned my back on him and walked toward the bathroom. The tile was cool beneath my feet, but I barely felt it. My thoughts were louder. Heavier. Tangled up in images I didn’t want but couldn’t stop.
Rafael. Bleeding. His voice like smoke and gravel, his mouth still curved in that maddening smirk even when blood darkened the fabric of his shirt.
He shouldn’t be here. Not like this at least.
He should’ve gone to Yuri or Nikolai. To anyone else. But instead, he’d knocked on my door—like a ghost stumbling in from a war I hadn’t been invited to.
I opened the cabinet and grabbed the med kit, fingers moving automatically. Alcohol, gauze, surgical thread. I didn’t hesitate. I didn’t shake. Because I’d done this before.
I had stitched up Ash in a motel bathroom once while blood soaked the towels and Kellan held the door shut with a Glock in his hand. That was the night I’d realized emotions would get me killed.
So I buried them.
I closed the cabinet slowly and exhaled through my nose. This wasn’t new. But it felt different.
I returned to the living room and stopped in the doorway, the med kit tight in my grip.
He hadn’t moved much. One arm slung across the back of the couch, the other now limp at his side. His fingers twitched slightly, his face tight. Pale, but not ghostly. His breathing wasn’t labored, but I saw the tension in his jaw, the stiffness in his movements.
Still holding on to control like it was the only thing tethering him to the ground. But it was his eyes that made me pause. Dark. Watchful. Like a wolf bleeding on the snow, still daring anyone to come close.
I didn’t speak at first. I just stood there and let myself look at him. Really look. And it hit me—this man, this monster, was still human. Flesh and bone and blood like anyone else. Just more ruthless about protecting it.
I stepped forward slowly. “You look like shit,” I said, setting the kit down on the table.
He gave me a humorless grin. “I’ve had worse nights.”
“Bet you say that to all the women you bleed in front of.”
He laughed under his breath, the sound cut short by a grimace. “Only the ones who keep threatening to kill me.”
I knelt beside him, opening the kit. “You’re lucky,” I said quietly, pulling on the gloves. “I’m only helping so I can be the one to kill you myself.”
He smirked. “Romantic.”
“No,” I said, meeting his eyes. “Strategic.”
Something flickered across his face. Not amusement. Not quite admiration either. Something darker. Quieter. “I like you better like this,” he said.
I arched a brow. “Bleeding?”