Chapter 30 Shelby #2
My stomach drops when she lifts her gaze to mine. There’s so much pain in her whiskey eyes that it wrecks my heart. Every instinct screams for me to hold her tight, to make that hurt go away. Whatever the fuck her devil of a father showed her has cut deep. That is painfully obvious.
But when I move in for a hug, her body stiffens.
I go still. And wait. Giving her the space she needs against all my caveman ethics.
“When my father had me... when he was trying to break me.” She takes another sip from the glass. “Cesare showed me surveillance footage. You and a blonde woman on the terrace. In the penthouse where you and I—” She stops, her cheeks flushing.
My blood turns to ice. “Another woman?”
“Against the mirrored windows. The same position we—” She shakes her head.
“That’s impossible,” I hear myself say, my voice hollow. “I haven’t touched another woman since I returned from Russia. Hell, I’ve never taken a woman to the penthouse.”
The truth of it settles between us, heavy and absolute. No one else. Not since Serena. Not even the thought of someone else.
Then another realization hits, harder than the first.
My fist connects with the coffee table before I’m consciously aware of deciding to punch anything. Pain explodes through my knuckles, but it’s nothing compared to the fury burning through my veins.
“Motherfucker had eyes on us.”
“That much I realized then.” Serena’s face goes pale, then red, emotions cycling too fast to process. “My father used the drones I designed to spy on me, on us. But it wasn’t me in the video. It was an employee of Crimson Velvet—”
“No way,” I say flatly.
“Son of a bitch.” She’s on her feet now, pacing, hands clenched into fists.
“Deepfakes. They used footage from the surveillance system, plus her image captured at the club or some social event, to generate a fake video. Different woman, same movements, same positions.” She stands in front of me, fists on her hips, her cheeks flaming red.
“I should have recognized the inconsistencies. I’m the fucking expert, and I fell for a cheap manipulation because—”
“Because you were chained to a bed in the dark without food or water.” I wrap an arm around her waist, pulling her onto my lap. “Because your father was systematically trying to destroy you. Because you were under duress.”
“I doubted you.” Her voice cracks, lacing her fingers behind my neck. “He showed me that video, and I doubted you.”
“Serena.” I tuck a strand of hair behind her ear. “Take it easy on my wife. She was under too much pressure.”
Something in her expression crumbles. The walls she’s been rebuilding since her kidnapping, the armor she keeps adding layer by layer, all of it falls away.
I cup her face in my hands, careful of the fading bruises, and press my lips to her forehead, offering reassurance. A promise that we’re still here, fighting together.
“I told you once that I was terrified of what you were becoming to me,” I murmur against her hair. “I’m not terrified anymore.”
“Why not?”
“Because I already lost you once. Watched my entire life burn down while you were in that dungeon. And I realized that the fear of losing you is nothing compared to the reality of living without you. I’d rather be afraid by your side than safe and alone.”
Serena’s hand rises to cover mine on her cheek. Her fingers are warm now, steady.
“I never told you about Marco,” Serena says finally. “My cousin. My advisor.”
I hold her gaze. “I bumped into him over the years, but you never talked to me about him.”
“I trusted him, valued his advice, so I used to tell him everything.” Her voice is distant, remembering. “All my plans for the family operations. About my vision for our future and my dreams of having a more active role in my family’s legitimate business. I trusted him completely.”
“What happened?”
“He went to my father behind my back. Told him I was too emotional, too soft to handle real responsibility. Used every vulnerability I’d shared and turned it into a weapon against me.
” Her jaw tightens. “I had to destroy him to survive. Had to prove I was harder and colder and more ruthless than anyone gave me credit for.”
“And you’ve been building walls ever since.”
She nods. “Trust equals betrayal. That’s what I learned. Every time I let someone in, they find a way to use it against me.” A smile breaks through, lighting up her face. “Except you.”
The words hang between us, fragile and precious. We’ve both been broken. We’ve both built fortresses around our hearts to keep from being broken again. But we’ve found our way through each other’s walls. Somehow.
I want to pull her close and never let go, but she’s not done talking.
“My father showed me that video to break me,” Serena says.
“To make me believe you’d moved on.” She reaches up, traces the line of my jaw with her fingertips.
“But even when I doubted everything else, I knew you wouldn’t betray the fight.
I knew you were still hunting the people who killed your mother.
That you’d still come for those women and children, even if you weren’t coming for me. ”
“I was always coming for you.” My voice is rough. “I will always come for you.”
She kisses me then. Soft at first, tentative, like she’s testing whether this fragile thing between us can survive everything we’ve been through.
When I respond, when my hand slides into her hair and my mouth opens against hers, the kiss deepens into something fiercer.
Something that tastes like whiskey and tears and hard-won hope.
We don’t make it to the bedroom. The couch is close enough. We don’t undress fully, just enough to align my erection with her heat. But I’m careful with her, mindful of every bruise, every mark left by men who thought they could break her.
She’s not careful with me at all. Her nails rake down my back, her teeth find my shoulder, her body arches into mine with a desperation that matches the hunger burning in my chest.
Alive. We’re alive. We survived.
I make sure she comes a few times before I finally let go, burying myself deep inside her. Afterward, we lie tangled together on the couch, my heart hammering against her cheek where her head rests on my chest. Dawn light filters through the blinds, painting everything in shades of gold and rose.
“We should sleep,” she murmurs against my skin.
“Probably.”
Neither of us moves.
“There are fifteen people who will wake up safe tomorrow because of what we did tonight,” I say quietly. “That’s what wholehearted looks like.” I press my lips to her hair. “Not perfection. Not fixing everything. Just doing what we can, when we can, with everything we have.”
Serena shifts, propping herself up to look at me. The sunrise catches her amber eyes, turning them to molten gold.
“Together,” she says. It’s not a question.
“Always.” I pull her back down against me. “Now sleep, álainn. We’ve got another war to fight tomorrow.”
Her body relaxes against mine as exhaustion wins the battle against adrenaline. I stay awake a little longer, watching her—the curve of her shoulder, the way she breathes, the shape of her against me—memorizing every detail to make sure Serena is here with me.
Safe. Whole. Mine.
And for the first time in my life, I let myself believe that maybe I’m allowed to have this.
That love might not bring death.
Because now I know love is the only thing worth staying alive for.
Serena taught me that.
I close my eyes and let sleep take me, my wife in my arms.
Tomorrow, we finish what we started.
But today, we’ve already won.