“Papa.”
A silence, measured and dense.
“Where are you?” His accent is heavier when he’s angry, all harsh consonants and clipped vowels.
“Safe.”
“That’s not an answer.”
I glance back at Bam. He’s sitting up now, bare to the waist, arms folded. He watches me like he’s waiting for the punchline.
“I’m with Bam,” I say, because there’s no point hiding it. “And I’m not coming home.”
“I had hoped Leone was mistaken when he returned. It appears that is not the case.” Papa’s exhale is a storm. “You listen to me.That animal is nothing. You are everything. You come home, now, and I will fix this. Otherwise—”
I cut him off. “Otherwise what?”
He pauses, calculating. “Otherwise, I will make moves you cannot comprehend to get you back.”
I almost laugh. The threat lands, but not the way he thinks. “You can’t control me, Papa. A life hiding behind the Bonaccorso name, isn’t the life I want for myself.”
His silence is colder than the cabin floor.
“Dahlia,” he says, softer now. “I did everything for you. You’re my legacy.”
I want to cry, but I don’t.
“Maybe I don’t want it,” I whisper.
He’s quiet for so long I think he might have hung up. But then he speaks, and I hear the old hunger in his words: “He’ll ruin you, Lia.”
I look at Bam, at the way his eyes soften when he thinks I’m not watching. “Maybe I want to be ruined.”
“You’ve made your bed, Dahlia. I hope you’re willing to lie in it.”
The line goes dead.
I let the phone slide from my fingers, collapsing to the floor in a heap of limbs and regret. My lungs burn, but it’s not the cold this time. It’s the certainty that, for once, I did the right thing.
Bam is behind me in three strides, the blanket stripped away, his hands at my shoulders. He pulls me upright, chin tipped up to meet his gaze.
“You okay?”
“Yeah.” My voice is shredded, my heart aching. “He’ll come for us.”
He grins, and the animal is back. “Good. I was getting bored.”
I lean into him, letting his heat chase away the last chill. His hand finds the back of my head, fingers threading through my hair, tugging just enough to remind me who I am, who I belong to.
“Next time,” he says, voice a promise, “you let me talk to him.”
I want to argue because there’s no way in hell that’s happening, but I just nod.
We sit there, two broken things, bracing for the next attack. And in that space, I know: whatever comes for me, I’ll face it on my feet, not my knees.
Even if it kills me... at least I’ll have had a frozen moment in time where my life was mine to live and die as I choose.
We barely have a minute of quiet before the world comes crashing back.
