Chapter 53

Mira’s POV

He came back on a Thursday.

I knew because I’d been counting. Four days, three ignored calls, and one very pathetic voicemail I left at 2am that I would take to my grave before I ever acknowledged again. Four days of sitting in this house that smelled like him, eating food I didn’t taste, and pretending to Zara over the phone that I was holding it together.

I was not holding it together.

I heard his car first. I’d learned the specific sound of that engine without meaning to, the way you learn things about people when you love them without permission. I was in the kitchen pretending to make tea when the front door opened.

I didn’t move.

His footsteps crossed the entryway then stopped somewhere behind me.

Neither of us said anything for a long second.

“You’re back,” I said finally, because someone had to.

“It’s my house.”

Okay. So we were doing that.

I turned around slowly. He looked tired. Not the dramatic kind of tiredness that made men in movies look brooding and beautiful, just actually tired. Like he hadn’t been sleeping.

His jaw was tight and he was looking at me the way you look at something you haven’t decided what to do with yet.

“I called you,” I said.

“I know.”

“Three times.”

“I know, Mira.”

The way he said my name was different. Careful. Like he was handling it with gloves on.

I set my mug down and crossed my arms, not because I was defensive but because I needed something to do with my hands or I was going to lose my nerve completely.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

He didn’t react. Just watched me.

“I know that’s not enough,” I continued. “And I know how it looked. I know what I did to you when I said no and I’m not going to stand here and pretend it wasn’t cruel just because I had reasons.”

“You had reasons,” he repeated slowly. “That’s what we’re calling it.”

“Yes.”

“Care to share them?”

I’d been rehearsing this part for four days. Every version of it. The full truth, the half truth, the version where I told him about the woman from the club, the version where I told him about my heart, the version where I just threw myself at him and hoped that was enough.

I’d settled somewhere in the middle.

“I panicked,” I muttered. “Not because I don’t want you. Not because I don’t love you.” My voice stayed steady and I was proud of that. “But because there are things about me you don’t know yet. Things I should have told you a long time ago and kept putting off because I was scared of what you’d do with them.”

He was quiet.

“I couldn’t say yes to forever knowing I was still keeping things from you,” I said. “It felt dishonest. And you deserve better than a yes built on half a version of me.”

Something shifted in his expression. Not much. Just enough that I kept going.

“I was going to tell you everything at the gala,” I said. “That was the plan before you pulled out a ring and my brain short circuited. I still want to tell you. All of it. And then if you still want to ask me that question again after…”

I let that sit between us.

He looked at me for a long moment, the kind of look that felt like he was turning something over in his mind, checking it from every angle before he trusted it.

“What kind of things?” he asked.

“My past,” I said simply. “Who I was before you hired me. Where I came from. What I had to do to survive it.”

His jaw tightened slightly.

“Is it bad?”

Depends on who you ask. “It’s not pretty.”

“And you thought I couldn’t handle it.”

“I thought you’d decide you didn’t want to.”

He moved then, crossing the kitchen slowly until he was close enough that I had to tilt my head up slightly to hold his gaze. He looked down at me and there was something in his eyes that was so tired and so frustrated and so stupidly, stubbornly there for me that my chest hurt in a way that had nothing to do with my condition.

“You should have just told me,” he said quietly.

“I know.”

“Instead of humiliating me in front of nobody.”

“There was nobody there, Dro.”

“That’s not the point.”

“I know,” I said again. “I’m sorry. I genuinely am.”

He exhaled through his nose, dragging a hand through his hair, and I watched the tension in his shoulders do that thing where it doesn’t fully leave but it stops being a weapon.

“I don’t like being kept in the dark,” he said.

“I know that too.”

“Then stop doing it.”

“I will,” I said. “After the gala, I’ll tell you everything. Every single thing. And you can do whatever you want with it.”

He looked at me for another long second.

“Everything,” he repeated.

“Everything.”

He nodded once, slow, like he was filing that away somewhere.

Then he reached out and tucked a strand of hair behind my ear, his thumb grazing my cheek for just a second before he dropped his hand, and that one small thing nearly undid four days of holding myself together.

“I hate hotels,” he muttered.

I laughed before I could stop myself. It came out shaky and a little wet at the edges but it was real. “I could tell. You get dramatic when you’re uncomfortable.”

“I’m not dramatic.”

“You ignored three calls, Alejandro.”

“That’s called boundaries.”

“That’s called sulking.”

His mouth twitched. Not quite a smile but close enough that I felt it in my chest like warmth.

“You’re lucky I came back,” he said.

“You’re lucky I was still here,” I shot back.

He looked at me then, really looked at me, and something about it felt like the first real breath either of us had taken in four days.

“Don’t do that again,” he said quietly.

I didn’t ask which part he meant. I was pretty sure he meant all of it.

“I won’t,” I smiled.

He pulled me into him without warning, his arms wrapping around me in that firm, certain way he had that always made me feel like the world had stopped spinning at a concerning speed. I pressed my face into his chest and closed my eyes.

We stood there in his kitchen for a long time.

Not talking.

Not fixing anything, not really.

But together.

And right now that was enough to hold onto.

Just get through the gala, I told myself. Tell him the truth. Let him decide.

Just stay alive long enough to get there.