Chapter 97 Slipping Away
Dante POV
She was still asleep when I slipped quietly out of the bed and padded into the living room. I shut the door behind me with care, poured myself a glass of scotch, and coaxed the fire back to life. When I checked the clock on her wall, it was three in the morning.
Usually, sleep came easy with Isabella beside me. The softness of her skin, the faint sweetness of her scent, the way her hair brushed against me whenever she shifted in the dark all of it settled something restless inside me. Even when she was deep in sleep, her hands would wander over me as if she needed to confirm I was still there. My presence grounded her. I kept her warm so she would not have to hide inside those oversized clothes she used to wear, and I stood between her and every nightmare that haunted her.
I was her anchor but tonight, sleep would not come. My mind kept circling back to that painting. It clung to me like a shadow and every time I shut my eyes, I saw the colors again, the cold atmosphere, the way the scene looked exactly like it had that night. She had not worked from a photograph the way she usually did and she had painted it entirely from memory.
How the hell did she do that?
I dropped onto the couch and lifted the canvas into my lap. It was not small, medium sized, something meant to hang proudly on a wall. I leaned back and stared at it, studying the black hoodie on my body in the painting and the faint outline of the skull tattoo climbing the back of my neck.
She knew my tattoos as well as I did.
The jeans were right and the boots were right. Every detail was painfully accurate. I had never stopped to admire the lake the way she painted it, but I had stood there many times, staring across the frozen water while thinking about the bodies I had buried beneath its surface.
The snow looked real enough to crunch underfoot, a blend of powder and slush. The trees were perfect tall, bare, stripped of leaves by a brutal winter. The narrow path leading to the lake was exactly how it had been. She captured a view I had known for years, yet she had only seen it once and then there was me.
She did not paint my face, but she captured my silhouette with eerie precision. Even the way I stood was right, hands shoved into my front pockets, shoulders relaxed in that rare moment when I was not hunting or threatening anyone.
This woman knew me, kooking at the painting now, I saw more than accuracy. I saw the way she must have been looking at me. Something deeper lived in those brushstrokes. She had spared me once then aved me another time and even when I told her I still wanted to destroy her family, she stayed and I stayed.
I had never stayed with one woman this long. Every other connection had been quick, transactional, disposable but this this felt like a marathon, and for once, I was not eager to reach the finish line. I loved the way jealousy flashed in her eyes. I loved how she wanted me all to herself. I loved how safe she felt when I was near, how she tried to hide it and failed. I loved that she hated imagining what I did when she was not around. I loved that she hated even more when I walked away. I loved how she tried to push me out of her life and could never follow through.
I loved every twisted part of it.
What the hell did that make me?
I left her place and went back to mine down the road. It had been cleaned after the night someone tried to kill me, and even though that memory always surfaced when the elevator doors opened, it did not push me far enough to leave. I was not the type to run from ghosts. Especially not when the man responsible was already in the ground.
I made coffee and went into my office, paperwork waited stacks of it. The kind that came with the business when we were evaluating potential targets. I forced myself through it, burying my thoughts in details and numbers then an hour later, my phone rang.
Isabella, I leaned back in my chair and answered, unable to hide the smile tugging at my mouth. “Hey, baby.”
“Where are you?” The question came fast, almost panicked, like she had every right to demand the answer. “Home.”
A pause, then softer, hurt. “I did not know you were leaving.”
I had slipped out before dawn, long before she woke. No goodbye and no note. After staring at that painting all night, I had not trusted myself to stay because being with her was intoxicating. Too easy to forget what we really were. I should have killed her a long time ago. She should have killed me when she had the chance but we had both ruined each other’s plans. Stepping back now, it was obvious.
We were both in too deep. “I had things to handle,” I said.
“Oh.”
I never left like that. Usually, if I went somewhere, she came with me but confusion was a dangerous thing for a man like me, and that painting had cracked something open I could not ignore.
The silence between us stretched, heavy and alive.“ I feel like something is wrong,” she whispered finally, her vulnerability bleeding through the line. “Is there?”
“No, baby.” I exhaled slowly. “I just need some space right now.” She had asked for space once, after I refused to drop my vendetta against her family even after she saved my life, I did not know what she had realized during that time apart, but now it was my turn to think.
“That painting it is because of that, is it not?” Her voice trembled, weighed down by hurt.
I could have lied and It would have been easy but I had promised her honesty. “Do you remember what you asked me once?” I said quietly.
She went silent, not because she forgot, but because she did not want to say it. “I asked you never to leave me.”
“And I promised I would not and I am not going anywhere, I just need time.”
I stayed on the line, unsure what else could be said then she spoke again, softer but sharper. “I thought you said you were not a man who keeps promises.”
I was not and I had never cared about honor or reputation because money and pleasure had always been enough. “I am not,” I admitted. “But I always keep my promises to you.”
Another pause followed, longer this time. So long I thought the call had dropped.
Then, barely above a whisper, Isabella said, “Then why do I feel like you are already slipping away?”
And before I could answer, the line went dead.