Page 29 of The Ruin I Chose

I didn’t want to beg. But I also didn’t want to stay and watch him pretend I didn’t exist—like I was a secret he was ashamed of.

He looked at me, surprised.

“Fine,” he replied coldly.

“I’d like to stay at the resort I reserved.”

Marcello just nodded, eyes never meeting mine, fingers moving over his phone—his distance slicing into me sharper than any words. I felt hollow, like the air had been sucked from my chest. Every ache and longing I’d held in secret seemed to mock me. And just like that, something inside me cracked.

I felt stupid. Naïve. Like I’d imagined everything. I had thought I felt something. And maybe—just maybe—he felt something too.

But the universe hadn’t been kind lately. And it was foolish to believe this thing with him—whatever it was—could be anything real.

I remembered what he’d said: “You’re here for a few days.”

But then he’d worshipped me right after. It didn’t make sense. He could make me feel like the only woman in the world in private—make me believe I was the centre of his gaze like I was sacred. Like I was his. Yet in front of that smug, skinny bitch, he said nothing. He left me invisible. And that hurt more than I was prepared for.

He dropped me off at the palazzo and told me not to wait up, that he had some ‘business’ to attend to. I didn’t ask what kind. I didn’t want to know.

That night, I didn’t really sleep. I placed the diamond necklace on the dresser, beside a note that read:

I wanted to leave something behind. Something that said:

I was here. I mattered. Even if only for a moment.

Marcello had arranged a private jet for me to fly to Sicily.

I stared at the itinerary, confused. If he was being distant… why the gesture? Why the jet? It only deepened the ache.

He was everywhere. In the scent of my skin. In the ache between my legs. In the silence I carried. In the taste of my own moans. In the sheets I’d soaked with wanting.

And yet, he was nowhere. Just a ghost with hands. A contradiction I couldn’t hold in my hands.

As I boarded the plane the next morning, I looked out at Rome one last time. I didn’t know what awaited me in Sicily.

But one thing was certain—I needed distance from him. From whatever this was. From the version of myself that kept hoping for more.

I pressed my palms to my thighs, feeling the echo of his hands, the ache of him still curling inside me.

The plane lifted, carrying me away—but I carried him in every pulse.

CHAPTER 13

MARCELLO

I didn’t expect the quiet to feel this loud, like punishment.

Like she’d taken the air with her and I’d been left behind in a room full of ghosts. It felt like she’d ripped something out of me and left the wound open. Like I’d been gutted and didn’t even know it until the silence started screaming. The kind of silence that makes a man check his own pulse just to be sure he’s still alive.

I’d told myself she was temporary. Just a detour. But something about her had settled under my skin. Like water finding cracks in stone.

I hadn’t realised how much space she’d taken up until she was gone. It wasn’t loud, it was invasive. Like breath in my lungs, I didn’t know I’d been holding.

Our trip to the Vatican kept replayed in my mind. The way she looked at me with curiosity. With something softer as if she saw the fracture in me and leaned closer.

No one does that. Most people look away when they see the broken parts. Not without wanting something in return. But she didn’t want anything. And I didn’t know how to be held without being used.

She held my gaze like she wasn’t afraid of what she’d find beneath the polish—like she wasn’t afraid of the sinner behind the suit.