Total pages in book: 87
Estimated words: 86242 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 431(@200wpm)___ 345(@250wpm)___ 287(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 86242 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 431(@200wpm)___ 345(@250wpm)___ 287(@300wpm)
“You stayed,” he says, his voice rough with sleep and something deeper.
I nod, suddenly shy. “Didn’t feel like going anywhere.”
A silence blooms, heavy with all the words we haven’t dared say.
Then—he reaches for me.
His palm finds my cheek, rough fingers tracing over my skin like he’s learning it. Like he needs to.
“How’d you sleep?”
“Like a baby.”
He pulls me closer, mouth brushing mine with reverence, not hunger. But I feel the tremble in his hand. The restraint. The war he’s still fighting.
“You don’t know what I am, Ruthie.”
I look him in the eyes, cup his rough jaw in my hand, and whisper, “Then show me. Stop hiding behind the mask.” I sigh. “I know what you are with me.”
And that ignites him.
He rolls me onto my back like I’m something fragile, something to be cradled and consumed all at once. His mouth finds my throat, my collarbone, the curve of my breast—slow, worshipful, desperate.
“You don’t get to leave me,” he growls, forehead to mine. “You don’t get to light a fire and walk away.” He kisses my forehead. “Tell me to stop.” He breathes against my skin.
I press my knees around him instead, careful not to hurt the ankle.
“I won’t tell you to stop.”
The kiss that follows is molten—melting every defense, every fear, every wall he’s ever built. He slides inside me like it means something, like it’s the only thing that has ever meant anything. His forehead presses to mine, his hands caging my face like a vow.
“I don’t want to lose you,” he whispers, voice cracking. He doesn’t speak what we’re both thinking: like her.
I dig my fingers into his back, anchoring myself to the truth of it.
“Then don’t let go.” His hips still every few strokes as if he’s trying to hold himself together.
And we fall.
God, we fall.
His rhythm is slow and deep, like he’s trying to memorize how I break. I meet every thrust with a gasp and moan, a plea.
We shatter together. And then the world stills, and our mingled breath slows. He stays.
When we’re tangled in each other afterward—sweat cooling, breath syncing—he doesn’t pull away. He holds me tighter.
“Stay,” he says into my hair, his voice barely a sound. “Just… stay.”
I nod against his chest, eyes burning.
“I want to.”
I mean it. God, I mean it.
But then the phone rings.
Not his.
Mine.
My mother’s contact flashes on the screen.
And I know.
I sit up, the sheets falling. My skin instantly pebbles at the loss of his heat as Vadka is instantly alert, already reaching for his pants.
I answer.
“Mom?”
But it’s not her voice that answers—it’s the nurse—shaky and urgent. But I can hear my mom screaming in the background.
“Ruthie, help me. I’ve been attacked.”
Attacked?
“I’m coming,” I say, already moving.
“No,” Vadka orders, stepping in front of me. “We’re coming. But we’re not bringing Luka.”
His voice is different now. Sharp. Cold. Dangerous.
“Rafail,” he says, his call already connected. “You’re taking my boy. Ruthie and I—”
“We’re going in,” I finish, pulling on yesterday’s clothes with trembling hands.
The warmth is gone now.
But the fire between us?
Still burns. And now it has something to protect.
Chapter 15
RUTHIE
Mom's voice rises before I even round the corner. Slurred, frantic, a storm brewing behind the locked ward doors. My stomach knots the second I hear it—
“Whore! You brought him here? You brought him?”
She sees Vadka and sees every man who ever ruined her. Doesn’t matter that he’s still as stone, jaw carved from control, arms crossed like he’s ready to end the building but won’t. Her rage isn’t about logic. It never was.
I move fast. "Mom—"
She lunges, fingernails like claws, her voice splitting the air. I don’t flinch. Not even when her hand cracks across my cheek so hard my teeth clack together.
Then—he’s there.
Vadka lifts me like I weigh nothing. Not rough, not violent. But absolute.
He places me behind him, like a shield being sheathed, and turns to her with that death-quiet voice.
“You strike her again,” he says, “and I’ll make sure you’re restrained. You will not like that.”
“Fuck you,” she spits.
He steps forward.
She recoils.
“She's not your punching bag. Not anymore. She doesn’t owe you forgiveness just because your cage has padded walls.”
The nurse is calling security. Mom’s screaming now, but I can’t hear it. My cheek burns, but my ears are ringing with a different sound—
Another slap. The same hand, less wrinkled. My mother’s voice. “Tears again? You think crying gets you out of this?”
I’m six again. The walls blur.
And then—
Vadka turns. And everything fades but him.
He looks down at me, his hands clenched, trying not to touch me wrong. “Ruthie.”
My lip trembles.
Shit. I don’t want to cry again.
He doesn't speak again until we're in the cafeteria, the air sterile and too bright.
“Thought she said she was attacked.”
I roll my eyes. “Seems she said she was, but what really happened was one of her staff tried to force her to get therapy.”