Page 212 of Reckless Obsession

I miss him.

The admission moves through me slowly, poisonously. I miss him despite everything. Despite the silence. Despite Jake. Despite the way he let me walk out of his life.

Tonight, the missing feels profound and unavoidable.

Maybe it is because I watched Viktor stare at Tyler as if the whole room had narrowed down to one person. Maybe it is because Alex arrived for Lucas and Lucas’s entire face softened the moment he saw him.

Everyone has somewhere to put their affection and someone who reaches back.

I left before the thought could become something uglier.

I couldn’t go to Tristan’s actual penthouse. I couldn’t bear the thought of Jake answering the door. So I got on my bike, tore through the freezing November streets at terrifying speeds, and found myself parked outside this building.

This apartment was ours.

Tristan had bought it secretly when we first started seeing each other, a sanctuary far away from the prying eyes of our families and high society. If I couldn’t have him, I needed the ghost of him. I needed the only place where we had ever felt real.

I drag a deep, shaky breath into my lungs, raise my trembling hand, and type the six-digit passcode into the digital keypad.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

The lock turns with a familiar mechanical click-clack, the chime singing its cheerful two-tone melody.

My breath hitches.

He didn’t change the code.

I push the heavy door open and step across the threshold, shutting it quietly behind me. The sheer familiarity of the space hits me like an electric shock. The subtle scents of cedar, clean linen, and faint espresso linger in the air.

I walk farther in, stepping onto the dark hardwood of the open-plan living room. Everything is intact. The low-profile leather sofa, the marble coffee table, the expensive Italian floor lamp I insisted on buying because it looked ridiculous—it’s all still here.

My eyes drift toward the main wall above the fireplace.

My paintings are still mounted.

Every single dark, jagged, chaotic canvas I painted while I was here is hanging exactly where I left it. Not boxed away. Not thrown in the bin. Not replaced.

An intense ache tugs at my sternum as I take another slow, reverent step towards the kitchen island. The open-plan kitchen is untouched too. The same pendant lights hang above the island. The same barstools.

My throat tightens as I walk towards the hallway.

Click.

The sound of a heavy slide racking back cuts through the dark.

A tall, broad figure steps out from the shadows of the master bedroom corridor, raising a black semi-automatic pistol in a one-handed grip, leveling the barrel directly between my eyes.

My shoulders lock. My fingers flex around the helmet in my hand. Every instinct I have learned the hard way rises at once, alert and sharp.

Then the low amber glow of the city skyline through the floor-to-ceiling glass illuminates his face.

Tristan.

I freeze.

Our eyes collide across the dark living room, and time instantly fractures.

Tristan stands barefoot in low-slung black sweatpants and a black T-shirt, his broad chest rising and falling in harsh, shallow breaths.