Chapter 69 -
Despite everything, Nia laughed. It was a watery, broken sound, but it was real. “You are insufferable,” she corrected.
“That too,” Micheal agreed. He drained his own glass and set it down with exaggerated care. “But I am also right. You asked about Andrea because you wanted to understand Leo. You wanted to know what made him hurt so badly that he built all those walls. And now that you know, now that you understand the depth of his pain, you cannot unknow it. You cannot unfeel it.”
“So what do I do?” Nia asked, her voice small and lost.
“You do what feels right in the moment,” Micheal said. “You stop trying to plan ten steps ahead and just exist. If Leo does something that makes you angry, you get angry. If he does something that makes you happy, you let yourself be happy. If he does something that makes you care about him, you stop fighting it and just care. Simple.”
“Nothing about this is simple,” Nia said.
“You are right,” Micheal said. “It is incredibly complicated. But trying to logic your way through feelings never works. Trust me, I have tried. Many times. Always ends in disaster.”
They sat in silence for a while, both of them staring at the empty glasses, the empty bottle, the evidence of a night that had gone places neither of them had planned.
“Can I tell you something?” Nia asked finally.
“Always,” Micheal said.
“I am terrified,” Nia admitted. “Not just of Leo or the Don or this whole situation. I am terrified of myself. Of what I am starting to feel. Because if I let myself care about him, really care about him, and he breaks my heart or gets himself killed or decides I am not worth the trouble, I do not know if I will survive that.”
“You will,” Micheal said with absolute certainty. “You have survived everything else, Nia. A broken heart will not be the thing that takes you down.”
“How can you be so sure?” Nia asked.
“Because I have watched you,” Micheal said. “I have watched you navigate this house, stand up to Santiago, refuse to break when Leo threatened you, help with an investigation that could get you killed. You are a survivor, Nia Wallace. That is your superpower. And even if Leo breaks your heart into a million pieces, you will pick up those pieces and keep going. Because that is what you do.”
Nia felt fresh tears spill down her cheeks. “I do not feel like a survivor right now,” she said. “I feel like I am drowning.”
“Then let me throw you a rope,” Micheal said. He shifted closer, wrapping an arm around her shoulders and pulling her against his side. “You are not alone in this, Nia. You have me. You have Rosa. Hell, you even have Lucia, in her own twisted way. We are all stuck in this house together, and we are all just trying to survive the best we can.”
Nia leaned into him, letting his warmth and solid presence ground her. “Thank you,” she whispered.
“For what?” Micheal asked.
“For being honest,” Nia said. “For not treating me like I am fragile. For getting drunk with me and telling me the truth even when it hurts.”
“That is what friends do,” Micheal said. He rested his cheek on top of her head, his voice rumbling through his chest. “They tell you the truth. They hold you when you are falling apart. And they steal their brother’s expensive whiskey to make sure you do not have to face your demons alone.”
They stayed like that for a long time, wrapped in each other’s warmth, two broken people holding each other up in the darkness. The mansion creaked and settled around them, the old house breathing with the weight of all the secrets it held.
Eventually, Micheal’s breathing slowed, his head growing heavy against hers. Nia realized he had fallen asleep sitting up, his arm still around her shoulders, his body warm and solid against her side.
She should wake him, send him back to his own room before someone found them like this. But she could not bring herself to move. For the first time in weeks, she felt safe. Not because she was locked in a room or guarded by men with guns, but because she was not alone.
So she stayed, letting Micheal sleep, letting herself rest against him, and for just a little while, she let herself stop fighting. She let herself care. She let herself feel.
And in the quiet darkness of her room, with an empty whiskey bottle and a sleeping friend beside her, Nia Wallace finally admitted the truth to herself.
She was falling for Leonardo DeSanto.
And there was nothing she could do to stop it.
The warmth of Micheal’s presence and the soft rhythm of his breathing should have been comforting, but Nia found herself wide awake, staring at the shadows on the ceiling. The whiskey had left her feeling untethered, her thoughts slipping and sliding in directions she could not control. She could feel Micheal’s arm still draped over her shoulders, heavy and protective, but there was something in the air that felt unfinished, like he had more to say and was just waiting for the right moment.
As if sensing her wakefulness, Micheal stirred beside her. He lifted his head from where it had been resting against hers, blinking slowly in the dim lamplight. His eyes were unfocused for a moment, confused, before clarity returned and he seemed to remember where he was.
“Still awake?” he asked, his voice rough with sleep and whiskey.
“Cannot seem to turn my brain off,” Nia admitted.
Micheal shifted, pulling his arm back and stretching with a groan that sounded like his entire body was protesting the movement. He rubbed his face with both hands, then looked at her with an expression that had lost all of its earlier humor.
“Be careful, Nia,” he said quietly.
The words hung in the air, weighted with something that felt like genuine fear. Nia turned to look at him fully, her heart picking up speed. “Of what?” she asked.
Micheal leaned back against the bed, his shoulders slumping with exhaustion that seemed to go deeper than just physical tiredness. “Leo’s heart is a dangerous place,” he said. “If you are thinking about going there, about trying to reach him, you need to understand what you are walking into.”