50. Stefan
STEFAN
Stefan sat on his porch in the dark with a bottle of tequila and watched Erika’s villa across the grounds. Every window black. Curtains drawn. Fifty yards of path between his door and hers and neither of them crossing it.
He’d stood at her door for five minutes after she’d gone inside. He’d raised his hand to knock twice, and twice he’d let it drop, because the silence on the other side was a wall he couldn’t break through.
The tequila wasn’t helping. He’d known it wouldn’t from the first pour, but drinking was something to do with his hands and the alternative was crossing that path again and standing at her door again and being met with silence again, and he couldn’t do that. Not tonight.
Three sharp raps on his own door. Evenly spaced. “Stefan. Open the door before I pick the lock.”
He opened it. Isabelle took one look at him—the bottle on the table, the split knuckles, the broken glass on the floor—and didn’t comment.
She walked past him, sank onto the arm of his couch, pressed two fingers to her temple, and he knew from the circles under her eyes and her unwillingness to perform composure that whatever she’d come to say was going to be bad.
“The studio buried Stasia’s case. Again.”
His blood went cold.
“New lawyers. New NDAs. New payoffs.” She wasn’t looking at him. “Martin got on a call with Zenith yesterday and walked out with their full backing. A career’s worth of evidence—the testimonies, the patterns, the paper trail—neutralized. All of it.”
“You had witnesses.”
“I had women who were willing to talk.” Her jaw tightened. “Past tense. Two received settlement offers this week. The third was reminded—very politely—about the NDA she signed five years ago.”
He let that sink in. Three women who’d been willing to stand up.
Three women who’d looked at the machine and said yes, I’ll speak.
And in one week, Martin’s people had found each of them and closed their mouths with money or fear, and the system had worked exactly as designed, and something in Stefan that had held steady for eight years started to give.
He hit the wall before he knew he was swinging. Pain flared through his already-split knuckles and he didn’t care.
“So he wins? After Stasia, after eight years of testimonies and paper trails, after all of it?”
“For now.” She moved to the window, and the moonlight caught the silver in her hair and she looked older than he’d ever seen her, tired in a permanent way.
“The only attorney in this town with the teeth to take on Zenith is Sebastian Solokov. But he needs a plaintiff willing to go public. And Martin’s machine has made sure there isn’t one. ”
Stefan pressed his forehead against the wall he’d just punched.
“What about Erika?”
The question came from deeper than strategy. Not about the case or what about our evidence—what about the woman sleeping fifty yards away who had no idea what she was in the middle of.
Isabelle’s face changed. Not the cold calculation. Not the boardroom steel. Fear.
“That’s why I’m here.” She stood and crossed to him.
“Martin knows about the switch. He’s known for weeks—maybe longer.
And the studio just gave him a blank check and a pat on the back.
” Her voice was careful now, measured—the way she talked when she didn’t want to scare someone.
“If he’s feeling untouchable, if he thinks no one can stop him—”
She didn’t finish. She didn’t have to.
“She’s a loose end.”
The words came out of his mouth and he heard them and the floor was gone.
Erika was at a loose end. The woman he loved, the woman who’d pressed her hand over his heart and counted his heartbeat, who’d said Promise?
in the dark—she was a problem to be managed, a risk to be neutralized, and Martin had the studio’s blessing and years of practice in making women disappear.
“Get her off this island, Stefan. Tonight. Anneliese is flying in—that’s your window. Get them both on a plane before Martin has a chance to move.”
“She won’t see me. She won’t answer my calls.” The words scraped out. “She thinks I’m the one who destroyed her.”
“Then send Lily. Send a carrier pigeon. I don’t care how you do it.” Isabelle was at the door now. Her urgency was real. “Get her off this island before sunrise.”
“And if I can’t?”
“Then pray I’m wrong about Martin.”
The door clicked shut behind her, and her footsteps faded fast down the path—too fast for a woman who dealt in calm, measured control. That, more than anything she'd said, told him how scared she actually was.
Stefan stood in the middle of his wrecked villa and the dread was everywhere now—in his hands, in his throat, in the fifty yards of dark path between his porch and her door.
He went to Erika’s villa. Knocked. No answer. He knocked again. Pressed his forehead against the wood. The paint was cool. Jasmine from the garden bed beside the door. He thought about Erika.
“Erika.” His voice came out wrecked. “I know you can hear me. And I know you don’t want to.
But something is wrong—not the statement, not us, something else—and I can’t tell you what it is through a door.
” He waited. Nothing. “You can hate me. You should hate me. But please don’t be alone tonight.
Go to Lily. Go to anyone. Just—don’t be here by yourself. ”
Nothing. Not a sound. Not a footstep. Not even the shift of weight on a mattress.
“I’m sorry.” He said it to the wood, to the paint, to the silence.
“For not telling you sooner. For letting you find out the way you did instead of hearing it from me. I should have trusted you with it and I didn’t and I’ll carry that.
” His voice cracked. “Te amo. Whatever else you believe about me, that part is real. That part was always real.”
He pressed his split knuckles against the wood. The blood left a faint smear on the white paint. He thought about how she’d pressed her hand over his heart on the yacht and counted his heartbeat. He’d stand at this door all night if he thought it would make a difference.
It wouldn’t. He knew that.
He stepped back. He called Lily. Straight to voicemail. He texted: Erika is in danger. Martin. Call me the second you get this. The message sent. The screen stayed dark.
He called Alex and got three words in before Alex started talking about the statement and damage control and crisis management. Stefan hung up. None of that mattered. The thing that mattered was behind a locked door fifty yards away. She’d rather be alone with whatever was coming than let him in.
He sat on his porch steps. Her villa stayed dark. The moon was silver on the path. The palm trees moved in the wind. Her curtains didn’t stir.
Anneliese wouldn’t land until morning. Lily still hadn’t called back. Erika was alone in that villa, and there was nothing—nothing—he could do about it except sit here and watch and wait for a dawn he was terrified of.
He told himself he’d see her leave if she left. He’d hear the door if it opened. He’d catch her at first light and make her listen, even if she hated him for it.
He fell asleep at five thirty. The sky was just starting to gray. His head was against the porch railing. The bottle was empty beside him. He didn’t feel himself go—just blinked, and the dark was lighter, and then he was gone.
He would not forgive himself for that for a very long time.