Page 168 of The Ache That Stayed

It was easier to stay just out of reach.

In his world, betrayal had consequences. Permanent ones.

Men had disappeared for less. And yet—I was still here.

And I didn’t understand any of it.

And still—my traitorous mind searched for Santino. In the sound of a bike. In the spaces he used to occupy without asking.

And every time I realised he wasn’t there, a familiar ache lodged beneath my ribs.

Santino was never just an affair. He was a beautiful disaster waiting to happen, and I just crashed into it. We changed each other. I put my mark on him as deep as he put his mark in me.

And worse—I never got to tell him how I actually felt. Not when he was bleeding in my arms. Not before they took him away. And if he was gone… Then those words would stay unfinished forever.

I caught a stray tear that slipped out at the thought of that.

I knew one thing, though. If he survived the bullet from Darius, he wouldn’t survive Marcello’s. And that knocked the air out of my lungs.

That night, the villa felt quieter than it had in weeks.

The children were asleep. The house had settled. And for the first time since everything had broken open, there was nothing demanding my attention. Nothing to hide behind.

I stood at the balcony of the bedroom, my hands resting lightly against the railing, watching the sea stretch endlessly into the dark, trying to steady the ache inside me that refused to settle.

The air outside was colder than I expected. Or maybe it was just me.

I didn’t hear him approach. I only felt him when his hand came to my waist, steady, familiar—like nothing had changed. For a second, I closed my eyes. Because I didn’t trust myself to turn. My breath caught, and I went still. Not because I wanted to pull away, but because some part of me had already surrendered.

His grip tightened just slightly, pulling me back into him until my back met his chest.

“You’re avoiding me,” he said.

It wasn’t a question.

I swallowed. “I don’t know how not to.”

“Look at me.”

I shook my head. “I can’t.”

His hand moved, turning me toward him before I could answer. And just like that—I was facing him. There was no distance left. No space to hide in.

“Look at me, Roxanne.”

His fingers curled beneath my chin, lifting my face. His gaze held mine, dark, steady, searching—not for answers, but for me.

I did. And I broke.

“Why? —” I whimpered. “How can you still want me?”

The words came out raw, stripped of everything I had been holding in.

“How can you look at me and not see… everything I’ve done?”

His eyes darkened. His hand moved—fingers closing briefly around my throat, tightening—not enough to hurt, but enough to remind me exactly who he was.

“I wanted to kill you,” he said.