Something in me snaps. My body surges forward before I can think—rage boiling over, ready to claw the words from his mouth.
But Bennette catches me. His arms lock around my waist, solid and unyielding. “Not like this, Stella,” he growls low, holding me back with ease.
Donovan’s laughter cuts jaggedly through the room, triumph dripping off every sound.
Mac barrels forward, shoving him hard toward the open door. “Get the fuck out!” he roars, dragging Donovan’s fury into the night.
And just like that, the fight is gone from my body. The anger burns out, leaving nothing but ash. My knees give, and Bennett loosens his hold just enough for me to crumple to the floor.
The sob rips out of me before I can stop it, raw and shaking. My hands clutch at my braid, my dress, anything to hold myself together as the tears spill hot and furious. For the first time, I don’t care who sees me break.
Elaine is there instantly, kneeling beside me, her hand on my back, her voice a steady whisper. “He doesn’t win, Stella. He doesn’t get to take this from you.”
Bennett lingers, protective, a silent wall behind me. The rest of the room stays hushed, heavy with the sound of my unraveling.
Elaine helps me to my feet, her arm steady around my waist as if I weigh nothing. The room is silent behind us, heavy with everything unsaid, but I can’t meet their eyes. The whole night was ruined because of me. Because no matter how strong I pretend to be, he can still drag me down to the floor.
I let Elaine guide me upstairs, one step at a time, until the bedroom swallows us whole.
She doesn’t ask for words. Doesn’t demand anything. She simply lies down beside me, pulling me into her arms, her warmth pressing against the ache in my chest. I let her hold me, let her heartbeat steady mine, until at last my eyes close. Sleep finds me only because she doesn’t let go.
I wake to sunlight pressing against the curtains, but the heaviness in my chest hasn’t lifted. Elaine stirs beside me, her arm draped across my waist like an anchor. For a moment, I want to stay like this—weightless, quiet, and safe.
But safety isn’t real. Not for me. Not for a Carrington.
I pull away too fast, the mattress dipping, the air between us splintering. Elaine props herself on one elbow, her hair a dark tumble, her eyes soft in a way I can’t bear. “Stella…”
“Don’t,” I snap, more at myself than her. My hands shake as I rake my messy braids out. “You don’t understand. There are too many family secrets, things you don’t want to be dragged into. Things I can’t let you be dragged into.”
Elaine pushes up from the bed, standing tall, her shadow cutting across me where I sit. Fire flashes behind her calm, her voice steady but unyielding.
“Stella, we said no lies. I want you. The good parts, the bad, the messy, the ugly. Every single piece you think is unlovable, I want it. Don’t shut me out.”
Her words slice through the fog in my chest. My throat burns as I turn to face her, anger and fear tangling so tightly I can barely breathe.
“Fine,” I choke out. “You want the truth? God help us both.”
And I tell her. About my parents, about the letter, about the empire built on graves and secrets. How my father wasn’t the don, but the cleaner, the one they called when blood needed wiping away, when messes needed to vanish. How my mother smiled at men who never came home again. I don’t mean to say it, but it rips out anyway—the cash slipped under tables, the lies told to police, the families silenced so Carrington and Ferretti could stand taller. My uncle, the Don, really my half-brother, was made into a weapon before he was even grown. I can’t stop; it keeps coming, sharper, uglier, until I don’t even recognize my own voice anymore, only the sound of every truth I swore I’d bury spilling into the open, reckless and raw.
The words are still burning in my throat when the silence crashes in. Elaine’s eyes are steady, unflinching, but I can’t stand the weight of them. I turn before she can speak, my body movingon instinct, my hand on the door. My voice is barely more than a whisper, cracked and ruined.
“I don’t know if I can let this take you down with me.”
And then I’m gone, leaving her in the dark with the wreckage I finally spilled.
Elaine
Iwatch Stella disappear into the hallway. Strawberry and blood orange linger in the air, clinging like her ghost. Her words echo, jagged, relentless—“I don't know if I can let this take you down with me.”
I’ve walked through more storms than I’ll ever admit. I had to learn to become the storm so I wouldn’t drown in it. And what she doesn’t see, what she’ll never understand, is that her confession told me more than every ugly truth she spilled. It told me the only truth I needed. She thinks she’s poison. She thinks she’ll break me. But all I can think of is how much I still fucking want her. How I’d drink every drop of her venom if it meant I got to keep her.
The silence in her room is suffocating. I can’t stand still. I follow the echo of her absence until I find her out back, sitting at the table. The night air is heavy, alive with the smell of rain in the desert. Beyond the dark horizon, thunder rolls low and steady, and I swear I see her breathing easier for the first time all night. She’s watching the storm roll in, drinking it like fuel, daring the sky to give her more.
I stand at the door in silence, watching the incoming storm take her broken pieces and mold them into something unbreakable. She’s embracing the darkness, letting it carve her into the kind of woman who can’t be undone. The same storm I was built in, the one that remade me until lightning lived under my skin. Sunny days never felt real—only storms do. And right now, there’s only one truth I can’t deny.
She is mine.
I step onto the porch, quiet, but she doesn’t turn. Her shoulders are tight, hair loose and wild, strands tugged by the restless wind. I sit beside her without asking, letting the silence stretch between us. A flash of lightning paints her face in silver, and I think, God, she has no idea how much I’d burn just to keep her lit.
