Chapter 12 #12
Chapter 12
~ Shaylin ~
(Few hours ago - before the boardroom meeting)
I left Dante's office on shaking legs, my entire body trembling like I'd been caught in an earthquake. My knees felt weak, unreliable, as if they might buckle beneath me at any second, and I had to grip the doorframe just to steady myself before stepping fully into the hallway. My throat still ached where his fingers had pressed, and I could feel the phantom weight of his hands on my skin, possessive and punishing, like bruises that hadn’t yet surfaced but already lived beneath the flesh.
Every breath felt too shallow. Too loud. Like the building itself might hear the way I was barely holding together.
I was shaken up badly. Completely rattled.
Not just shaken—unmoored. Like something inside me had been knocked loose and hadn’t found its way back yet.
The worst part wasn't even what had happened — it was the war raging inside my own head.
The echoes of his voice followed me down the corridor, curling into my thoughts, twisting memories I’d spent years trying to bury.
Part of me had actually liked the attention, the possessiveness, the way Dante had claimed me like I was something worth fighting for. That pathetic, broken part of me that still loved him had thrilled at his jealousy, had felt validated by his need to mark me as his.
That part whispered that this meant I still mattered. That I hadn’t been completely discarded. That I was still his.
But the other part—the new part that was slowly, painfully waking up—was beating myself up for allowing this to happen. For letting Dante put his hands on me in anger. For almost giving in to him out of guilt and fear instead of desire.
That part screamed that this wasn’t love. That it never had been. That no amount of history justified the way he looked at me like something he owned.
I made it back to my desk somehow, focusing on putting one foot in front of the other, on keeping the tears locked behind my eyes where no one could see them. The office felt too bright, too normal, like the world had cruelly decided to keep spinning while mine had just fractured.
But Hannah noticed immediately. Of course she did.
She always noticed.
"What's wrong, Shay?" Her voice was soft with concern, her eyes searching my face.
Her chair shifted closer, the quiet scrape of it against the floor sounding unbearably loud in my ears.
I didn't even register the nickname. I couldn't. My mind was too full of Dante's voice in my ear, his threats, his promises of what would happen next time there were no interruptions.
"You're all red and hot," Hannah continued, reaching out like she wanted to touch my forehead to check for fever.
Her hand hovered just inches away, hesitant, as if she sensed I might flinch.
I pulled back instinctively. "Nothing. I'm fine. Just... a headache."
The lie tasted bitter on my tongue. Heavy. Hannah knew I was lying, I could see it written all over her face—but she didn't press. Instead, she just gently rubbed my hand, a small gesture of comfort that somehow made everything worse. Made the tears I was holding back press harder against my defenses.
Her kindness felt like a crack in a dam I was desperately trying to keep intact.
I tried to work. I pulled up my code and stared at the screen, but the lines blurred together into meaningless symbols. The cursor blinked mockingly, waiting for input I couldn’t give. Thirty minutes passed and I hadn't debugged a single line. I couldn't concentrate or even think. I couldn't do anything except replay what had happened in Dante's office over and over like a horror film stuck in a loop.
His hands. His voice. The way he’d looked at me like he dared me to walk away.
The tears were coming. I could feel them building, a tidal wave I couldn't hold back much longer.
My chest felt tight, compressed, like there wasn’t enough room in my lungs for air and emotion at the same time.
I stood abruptly, my chair scraping loudly against the floor. "Bathroom," I muttered to Hannah, not meeting her eyes.
I practically ran down the hallway, my vision already blurring, my chest constricting with the effort of keeping it together just a little longer. Just until I was somewhere private. Somewhere I could fall apart without an audience.
The hum of fluorescent lights buzzed above me, each step echoing too loudly, like everyone might turn and see exactly how broken I was.
I burst through the bathroom door and immediately collided with someone.
The impact jolted through me, sending a sharp spike of panic straight to my core.
Vanessa. One of Dante's secretaries. The one I'd caught him with — was it last week? Last month? They all blurred together now.
Her face was flawless, smug, untouched by the kind of devastation she helped create.
"Oh, Shailyn!" She didn't even have the decency to look embarrassed. Her lips curved into a cruel smile. "Just the person I wanted to see."
My stomach dropped.
I tried to move past her, but she blocked my path, her eyes glittering with malice. She planted herself deliberately, like she’d been waiting for this moment.
"You know, Dante was just telling me the other day how good I am," she purred, her voice dripping with false sweetness. "How I do things you could never do. How he loves the way I…"
"Stop." My voice came out as a broken whisper.
It barely sounded like it belonged to me.
But Vanessa wasn't finished. She leaned in closer, her perfume, one of the same perfume I'd smelled on Dante's clothes countless times, making my stomach turn. The scent wrapped around me, suffocating, dragging memories I didn’t want back to the surface.
"He talks about you, you know. About how pathetic you are. How you just lie there like a dead fish. He says being with you is like…"
The bathroom door opened.
Hannah stood in the doorway, her expression shifting from concern to fury as she took in the scene. "What the hell is going on here?"
Relief and humiliation crashed into me at the same time.
But I couldn't answer. The room was spinning now, the walls closing in. Everything Vanessa had said, everything Dante had done, everything I'd been holding inside for five years, it all came crashing down at once.
The dam finally broke.
My chest tightened.
The world tilted sideways.
I felt myself falling — sharp and sudden. My head slammed against the bathroom sink, a burst of pain before the cold tile rushed up to meet me. Somewhere in the distance, I heard someone screaming my name.
Then everything went black.