Page 124 of The Ache That Stayed

His voice softened, but it didn’t lose its edge.

“You think I didn’t try to stay away? I walked away for the same reason you’re trying to now.”

My chest went tight.

“I didn’t want to be the one who ruined your life. But the universe…” he exhaled sharply, almost a laugh, “has a fucked-up way of pulling you back into my orbit.”

He took my hand and pulled me into his lap, my legs falling to either side of him without thought.

“And now…” His thumb dragged across my lower lip. “After I’ve had you… felt you… held you when you were breaking…”

His jaw tightened. “I can’t let go.”

I didn’t know what to say. Suddenly my gaze caught on the dark cursive inked along his ribs.

‘Senza di lei.’

My brows pinched faintly.

‘Without her.’

The translation brushed the edge of my mind quiet enough to make my heart skip a beat. My fingers lifted before I could stop them, tracing lightly over the script. Santino went still, and then a subtle shudder rippled across his chest beneath my fingertips before his eyes locked onto mine.

A flash of vulnerability crossed his face so quickly I almost missed it, and suddenly the air between us felt dense with an intimacy that was far too real. Neither of us spoke. We just stared at each other, breathing the same air with certainty that the damage had already been done.

Before I could ask—his hand slid into my hair, and his mouth crashed into mine—ferocious and entirely desperate. He held me tighter after that, as though showing me that crack had cost him more than he wanted me to know.

Everything blurred. For a moment, it was just him. His voice. His hands. His presence.

The world receded.

Marcello. Responsibility. Right and wrong.

For one reckless moment, none of it existed.

It was only us, trapped in this impossible world of push and pull and choices that should’ve mattered more. And for one terrible, beautiful moment—he was all I could see.

CHAPTER 33

Santino

Sleep didn’t come easy. It came in fragments. Images. Sensations. Her skin soft beneath my calloused fingers. The marks I’d left on her skin. In flashes of her writhing under me, pulling me closer, wanting me deeper. The way she’d finally stopped fighting it. The sound of my name on her lips—broken, breathless, real.

It wrapped around every dream, every memory, every second of the night until it blurred, bleeding directly into reality. And when I woke, I was hard.

My hand dragged over my face as I exhaled slowly, the remnants of sleep clinging to me. For a moment, I didn’t move. I could still feel her. Taste her.

Grey light seeped through the curtains, dull and cold—early morning in Ireland, the kind that never fully committed to day. The room was quiet. I reached for her instinctively, but the bed was empty. Cold. The kind of cold that told you she hadn’t just stepped out. She’d been gone a while.

A mirthless laugh escaped me as I stared at the empty space beside me. Of course she ran. She didn’t bother facing me. Didn’t even try. My teeth ground together.

I’d thought I’d worn her out last night, orgasm after orgasm, until her body stopped knowing where she ended and I began.

I only let her sleep around four. Not because I was done—but because I knew she wouldn’t be able to take more.

Should’ve tied her to the bed. Bound her so she couldn’t escape me, couldn’t run from what we both knew was already ours.

I dragged a hand down my face again, a grim scoff escaping me.