Chapter 121: Take my Heart with you
The morning light in the main bedroom was the color of honey, thick and slow, cutting across the rumpled silk of the sheets. It warmed the bare skin of Damien’s shoulder, the intricate lines of his tattoos, before pooling in the hollow of Beth’s throat where she lay draped over him.
Home wasn’t a place. It was the weight of her head on his chest, the rhythm of her breath syncing with his. It was the only space where the armor fully came off, for both of them. He stared at the ornate ceiling, his hand tracing idle patterns on her back through the soft cotton of his borrowed pajama shirt. She was drowning in it, the cuffs hanging past her fingertips, smelling like him and sleep and them.
The Gulfstream was already on the Montgomery tarmac, fueled and waiting. Marco was downstairs, probably on his third coffee, radiating impatient energy. New York was a five-hour flight away, a city of concrete and obligation that suddenly felt like a different planet.
Beth stirred, a soft, discontented sound in the back of her throat. She turned her face into his chest, her arm tightening around his waist. “You don’t get to leave me yet,” she mumbled, the words slurred with sleep but her grip iron-strong.
He smiled into her hair. After a decade of her legendary, icy independence, he was still her happy place. The knowledge was a victory more profound than any territorial acquisition. “I have a city to run, amore. Meetings. Threats to frown at.”
“Let Marco frown. He’s better at it.” She pressed a kiss just over his heart, then another, her lips traveling up the column of his neck. It was a deliberate campaign, a tactical assault of warmth and softness designed to dismantle his resolve.
He laughed, a low rumble she felt through her whole body. “He’s also better at collecting overdue debts. Doesn’t mean I should outsource everything.”
“Just the boring things.” She found his lips, silencing any further argument with a kiss that was slow and deep and tasted of shared morning breath and pure want. Her hand slid down his stomach, slipping beneath the waistband of his pants.
He caught her wrist, not to stop her, but to feel the frantic pulse beating there. “Bethany. The pilot’s on the clock.”
“I’ll pay his overtime,” she whispered against his mouth, her other hand tunneling into his hair. “I’ll buy the damn airline. Stay.”
It was a game and it was deadly serious. Every second stolen was a rebellion against the ten years they’d lost, against the separate empires that demanded their attention. He rolled, pinning her beneath him, the sun haloing her wild black hair on the pillow. The shirt had slipped off one shoulder. He saw the faint, faded scar on her collarbone—a reminder of a skirmish from her old life, before the vineyards and boardrooms. A life that had just resurfaced in her office with a plate of poisoned cookies.
He kissed the scar. “You’re driving me crazy.”
“That’s the plan.”
For a long while, there was only the sound of rustling linen and hitched breaths and the distant cry of a hawk circling the pastures. The chandelier above them seemed to hold its breath. In the tangled heat, the weight of the last few days—the confrontation, the kill, the calm aftermath in the stables—melted away, leaving nothing but the visceral truth of skin on skin.
Later, she watched him dress from the sanctuary of their bed. He moved with an efficient grace, pulling on a black suit that cost more than most cars, the fabric straining slightly across his shoulders. He was transforming back into Damien Rossi, New York sovereign, before her eyes. The intimacy of the morning clung to him in the slight dampness at his temples, in the faint red mark her lips had left just above his collar, which he made no attempt to conceal.
“I’ll be back Thursday,” he said, catching her gaze in the vanity mirror as he fastened his watch. “Four days. We’ll finalize the security details for the north pastures.”
“And the wedding planner wants to know if we’re serious about the ice sculpture of Buttercup,” she said, her voice still husky.
He grinned, the charming, dangerous flash of teeth that could make diplomats and hitmen equally nervous. “Tell her it’s non-negotiable.”
She finally untangled herself from the sheets, padding barefoot to the vanity. She looked a mess—well-loved and sleepy—and she didn’t care. As she reached for a hair tie, her fingers brushed the cold metal of the compact. The one with the .22 derringer nestled beneath the powder. A callback, a quiet echo of the poison in the office. Her world. Their world now. She left it closed.
Downstairs, the smell of bacon and coffee fought with the permanent scent of bergamot and polished wood. Marco was leaning against the grand staircase newel post, scrolling on his phone. He looked up as Damien descended, his hazel eyes taking in his best friend’s appearance, the mark on his neck, the specific ease in his posture.
“Look at you. All… de-stressed,” Marco said, his smirk cutting through his scar. “I’ve been down here being emotionally supportive of Dove while she murdered a skillet of eggs. It was harrowing.”
“You seem traumatized,” Damien said, grabbing the travel mug of coffee from the hall table.
“I’ll need therapy. And a raise.” Marco’s gaze flickered past Damien to where Beth stood on the landing, wrapped in a silk robe now, watching them. He gave her a small, genuine salute with his own mug. “Boss.”
“Don’t let him work too hard,” Beth said, her tone shifting into its usual crisp command, though her eyes were soft.
“He’s the boss,” Marco shrugged. “I just point the guns where he tells me.”
The goodbye at the front door was brief. In their world, prolonged farewells were a vulnerability. Damien kissed her, once, hard and promising. “Thursday.”
“Try not to start any wars without me,” she said, her fingers tightening on the lapels of his suit for a fleeting second.
“No guarantees.”
She watched from the doorway as the black SUV crunched down the gravel drive toward the private airstrip. The Texas sky was vast and unforgivingly blue. The silence of the ranch, usually a comfort, now felt immense and echoing.
Back in the bedroom, the sheets still held his warmth. She didn’t straighten them. She walked to the window, pulling her robe tight, and watched as the sleek white jet taxied into position. A tiny figure—Damien—paused at the top of the stairs to look back at the house. She knew he couldn’t see her, not through the glare on the glass, but she lifted her hand anyway.
The plane turned, accelerated, and became a speck, then a silent cut across the endless sky.
Her phone buzzed on the nightstand. A text from an unknown number, but the area code was Juárez.
The message was received. Accounts are settled. A question of future import remains.
Beth picked up the phone, her thumb hovering over the screen. The sun gleamed off the vanity mirror, reflecting a woman who was no longer trying to be just one thing. She typed a single word.
Proceed.
Downstairs, a door slammed. Dove’s voice echoed up the stairwell. “Beth! The farrier’s here and he’s arguing about the bill again. Wants to talk to the owner.”
Beth took a final breath of air that still smelled like him. Then she turned from the window, her bare feet cool on the polished floor, and headed for the stairs. The ranch was waiting. Her empire was waiting. And so, she knew, was whatever lay on the other side of the door she had just locked behind her.