AUTHOR'S NOTE
I made this chapter longer because of all the support I was receiving. Thank you all so much as you like, comment and share.
VIVIENNE POV
The chains were still on.
Lorenzo sat in the chair by the window, watching me. He'd been there for an hour. Silent. Unreadable.
I was done being quiet.
"You're pathetic," I said.
He didn't blink.
"You sit there like a guardian angel, but angels don't chain people to beds. You're a jailer with a guilty conscience."
"Keep going," he said. His voice was flat. "Maybe you'll bore me into leaving."
"You won't leave. You can't. Because if you leave, you have to admit what this really is."
"And what's that?"
I leaned forward as far as the chains allowed. The metal pulled taut.
"This isn't about Tanaka. It isn't about Moscow. It's about you being too much of a coward to let anyone close. Your parents died, and you decided the whole world was a fire. So now you lock everything inside. Your feelings. Your past. Me."
His jaw tightened. Good.
"You think I don't see it?" I continued. "The way you looked at that photograph in your office. Not rage, Lorenzo. Grief. Twenty years old and still crying over a ghost. That's not strength. That's a boy who never grew up."
"Vivienne—"
"No." I cut him off. "You wanted me to talk. So listen. You're not protecting me. You're collecting me. Like a trophy. Like a distraction from the fact that you have nothing else. No family. No future. Just revenge that's already cold."
He stood. Slowly. Dangerously.
"You don't know what you're talking about."
"I know you're afraid." I smiled. It wasn't nice. "I know every time I get close, you flinch. I know you'd rather put me in chains than hear me say your name like it matters. Because if I mattered—really mattered—then you'd have something to lose. And you've already lost everything once."
He walked to the bed. Leaned over me. His face was inches from mine.
"You want to push me?" His voice was low. Shaking. "Keep talking."
"Your father would be ashamed of you."
The room went cold.
"Not because of the chains," I said. "Because you're using them as an excuse. He raised a son who hides behind locks and calls it love. That's not the man I see in those old photographs. That's not a man at all."
Lorenzo's hand shot out. Grabbed the headboard beside my head. The wood creaked.
"You don't get to talk about my father."
"Why not? You talk about mine. You said he gave me to you. That he trusted you. But here's the difference—my father let me go to save my life. You're keeping me locked up to save your ego."
His breathing was ragged. His knuckles were white.
"I should walk away," he said.
"Then walk. That's what you do, isn't it? Run away before anyone sees the cracks. Your parents died and you've been running ever since."
He straightened. Took a step back.
"You have no idea what I've done to stay alive."
"I don't care what you've done. I care what you're doing now. And right now, you're a man chaining a woman to a bed because you're too broken to handle a conversation."
Silence.
Heavy. Suffocating.
Then he laughed. It was hollow. Dead.
"You're right," he said. "About all of it."
I blinked. That wasn't what I expected.
"I'm broken," he continued. "I'm afraid. I'm hiding behind these chains. But you know what, Vivienne? So are you. You're so busy poking at my wounds that you haven't looked at your own. Your mother died. Your father sent you away. And instead of dealing with that, you're picking fights with the only person trying to keep you breathing."
"That's not—"
"That's exactly what this is." He walked to the door. "You want brutal? Here's brutal: I'm not going to argue with you anymore. I'm not going to sit here and let you tear me apart so you don't have to look at yourself. You want to be angry? Be angry. But do it alone."
The door opened.
"Where are you going?" I demanded.
"Away. Until you remember that I'm not the enemy."
"Lorenzo!"
He stopped. Didn't turn.
"You wanted to know what happens when you push too far?" His voice was quiet. Dead. "This."
He left.
The lock turned.
And that was the last time I saw him for fourteen days.
---
Day One of Fourteen
He didn't come back.
Not the next morning. Not the next night. Not when I screamed his name until my throat bled. Not when I rattled the chains so hard the headboard cracked.
Marta came. Katya tried to visit through the door. Nico stood guard like a statue.
But Lorenzo? Gone.
I stopped eating on day four.
Not to manipulate him. Not anymore. Because the silence was worse than the chains, and the only thing I could control was what went into my body.
So I controlled nothing.
The trays came back full. Marta begged. Katya cried through the door. Nico said nothing.
Lorenzo didn't come.
By day ten, I couldn't stand without holding the wall. My reflection was a stranger—hollow cheeks, dark eyes, lips that had forgotten how to smile.
By day twelve, I stopped getting out of bed.
By day fourteen…
The last thing I heard was Marta's scream.
Then nothing.
---
LORENZO POV — The Collapse
I was in the basement when Marco found me.
The Moscow file was spread across the table. Every name. Every photograph. Every ghost. Tanaka's face had been staring back at me for hours. I hadn't slept in three days.
Marco didn't knock.
"Boss. It's Vivienne."
I looked up. "What about her?"
"She collapsed. Marta found her on the floor. She hasn't eaten in two weeks."
I was already moving.
---
The guest room was chaos.
Marta was crying in the corner. Katya was holding Vivienne's head in her lap, slapping her cheek, calling her name. Vivienne's face was gray. Her lips were blue.
"She stopped eating," Katya snapped. "We told you. Every day. You didn't listen."
I knelt beside her. Pushed the hair out of her face. Her skin was cold.
"Get the doctor. Now."
Nico was already on the phone.
I looked at her wrists. The cuffs. The chains.
I pulled the key from my pocket. Unlocked the cuffs. One by one. The metal clinked onto the floor.
Her wrists were raw. Bruised.
Then I lifted her. She weighed nothing. Her head lolled against my chest. For one horrible second, I thought she was dead.
Then her fingers twitched.
"Stay with me," I said. "Vivienne. Stay with me."
She didn't open her eyes.
But her lips moved.
Hate you.
I carried her to my room. The biggest bed. The most space. I laid her down like she was made of glass and stood back as the doctor arrived.
IV. Monitors. Low voices.
Dante pulled me into the hallway.
"She did this on purpose," he said quietly.
"I know."
"She wanted to force your hand."
"I know."
"Then why do you look like someone just died?"
I didn't answer.
Because the truth was worse. She'd rather starve than stay in that room. And I was the one who put her there.
---
VIVIENNE POV
I woke up in a different room.
Bigger. Darker. It smelled like him.
Lorenzo's room.
I was in his bed. His sheets. His pillows. An IV taped to my arm. A heartbeat monitor beeping somewhere to my left.
No chains.
I tried to sit up. Failed.
"Don't."
His voice. From the doorway.
He was standing there, arms crossed, dark circles under his eyes. He looked like he hadn't slept in a week.
"How long?" I whispered.
"Two days. You almost died."
I looked at the IV. At the monitor. At my bare wrists.
"The chains," I said.
"Gone. I took them off before I carried you here."
I laughed. It came out hollow.
"You only let me go when I'm half dead. That's not protection, Lorenzo. That's neglect."
He didn't answer. He couldn't. Because I was right.
He turned to leave.
"Don't," I said. "Don't walk away again."
He stopped. Didn't turn.
"I'm not walking away. I'm getting you food."
"I'm not hungry."
"You're going to eat anyway."
He left.
The door didn't lock.
I heard that. Noticed it. Filed it away.
---
KATYA POV — That Night
The doctor said Vivienne needed rest. The IV would stay in for another twenty-four hours. After that, she could eat solid food.
"She's still weak," the doctor told Lorenzo. "Don't let her push herself."
Lorenzo nodded. Then he went to his study. Nico followed. Dante was already there.
Three men. One file. One obsession.
And Vivienne, alone in Lorenzo's room, with an unlocked door.
I waited until the study door closed. Until the guards were posted at the main entrances instead of the bedroom. Then I slipped inside.
She was awake.
"Katya?"
"Shh." I knelt beside the bed. "How fast can you move?"
Her eyes widened. "What are you—"
"I'm getting you out of here. Tonight. Before he comes back."
She stared at me. "He'll kill you."
"He won't. I'm engaged to Nico." I pulled a bag from behind my back. Clothes. Shoes. A key I'd stolen from Marco's office. "He might lock me in a room for a week, but he won't kill me."
"You're insane."
"Probably." I helped her sit up. The IV pulled. I ripped the tape off and pulled the needle out. "Can you stand?"
She swayed. Caught herself.
"I can try."
"That's all I need."
---
We moved through the house like ghosts.
Katya knew the guard rotations. Knew which cameras were down for maintenance. Knew the blind spot by the kitchen where the wall met the garden door.
Vivienne leaned on her, every step a battle.
"Almost there," Katya whispered.
The garden door was unlocked.
Outside. Cold air. Stars.
And a car.
Katya had parked it an hour ago, engine off, lights off, hidden behind the hedge.
"Get in."
Vivienne collapsed into the passenger seat. Katya slid behind the wheel. The engine turned over.
The gate was ahead.
Two guards. Armed.
Katya didn't slow down.
She hit the gas.
The guards dove aside. The gate splintered. The car screamed onto the road.
And behind them, alarms started blaring.
---
VIVIENNE POV
The countryside blurred past. Dark fields. Empty roads. No headlights behind us yet.
"You planned this," I said.
"Three days," Katya replied. "Ever since I saw what the chains did to you."
"Where are we going?"
"Somewhere Lorenzo doesn't know. A safe house my father used. It's three hours north."
I looked back.
No lights.
Maybe we'd made it.
Maybe—
The car swerved.
A truck, headlights blinding, cutting across the road. Katya slammed the brakes. The car spun. Gravel. Grass. The world tilted.
We stopped in a ditch.
The airbag hit me in the face.
When I looked up, the truck had stopped too.
Doors opened.
Men. Four of them. Armed.
And one man in the middle, shorter than the others, collar up, face angled away from the camera.
But I knew him.
Kenji Tanaka.
"Vivienne Moretti," he said, stepping closer. His English was precise. Accented. "You're harder to find than your father said."
Katya reached for something in the door.
"Don't," Tanaka said.
One of his men raised a gun.
Katya froze.
I looked at her. She looked at me.
We'd escaped one cage.
And driven straight into another.
---
KATYA POV
They dragged us out of the car.
I kicked. Bit. Hit.
One of them backhanded me across the face. My lip split. Blood filled my mouth.
Vivienne was fighting too—weak, stumbling, but fighting. She drove her elbow into a man's throat. He went down.
Two more took his place.
Tanaka watched. Calm. Almost bored.
"Enough," he said.
No one listened.
Vivienne grabbed a rock from the ditch. Swung it at the nearest man's head. He crumpled.
"Behind you!" I screamed.
She turned. Too late.
A fist caught her stomach. She folded. Hit the ground.
I lunged for the man who'd hit her. Got my arms around his neck. Held on.
Something slammed into my ribs.
I didn't let go.
Another hit. Another.
I couldn't breathe.
But I didn't let go.
"Katya—" Vivienne's voice. Far away.
I felt my knees buckle.
The world went gray.
Then—
Tires.
Screaming tires.
Headlights. Not a truck. A car. Black. Fast.
It didn't stop.
The driver's door opened while the car was still moving.
Nico.
He hit the first man like a wrecking ball. The man's gun fired into the sky. Nico didn't stop. Didn't slow. He was death in a leather jacket.
And behind him—
Lorenzo.
I'd never seen him like this.
Not controlled. Not cold.
Furious.
He didn't go for the men. He went for Tanaka.
The ex-FSB agent turned. Ran.
Lorenzo caught him in three strides. Drove him into the ground. His fist came down once. Twice. Three times.
"Alive!" Dante shouted. "He said alive!"
Lorenzo's fist paused.
Then he grabbed Tanaka by the collar and hauled him to his feet. Tanaka's face was bloody. One eye was already swelling shut.
"You're going to tell me everything," Lorenzo said. "And then I'm going to decide if death is too good for you."
Tanaka smiled through bloody teeth.
"I've been waiting twenty years for this conversation," he said. "Ask me the right questions, Lorenzo. And maybe you'll finally sleep at night."
Lorenzo hit him again.
Then he dragged him to the car.
---
VIVIENNE POV
I was on my hands and knees in the ditch.
My body was screaming. The IV hole in my arm was bleeding. My stomach was on fire. But I was alive.
Tanaka was alive.
And Lorenzo was looking at me.
He walked over. Knelt in front of me. Didn't touch me.
"You tried to escape."
"Yes."
"You almost died. Again."
"Yes."
He closed his eyes.
"Vivienne."
"Don't." I pushed myself up. Stood on shaking legs. "Don't tell me you were protecting me. Don't tell me you did this because you care. You left me in that room for two weeks. You let me starve. You let me collapse."
His face went pale.
"I didn't know—"
"You didn't want to know." I stepped closer. "Because if you'd come to that room, you would have had to look at me. And looking at me meant seeing what you did."
He didn't answer.
I turned to Katya. She was in Nico's arms, bleeding from her lip, but alive.
"Thank you," I said.
She nodded.
Then I looked at Lorenzo again.
"What happens now?"
He glanced at Tanaka, bleeding in the back of the car.
"Now we talk. And then we decide what kind of monsters we want to be."
He held out his hand.
I didn't take it.
I walked to the car on my own.
And for the first time in two weeks—
I sat in the front seat.
Not the back.
Not a cage.
The front.
Lorenzo got in the driver's seat. Started the engine.
He didn't look at me.
But he didn't lock the doors either.
NICO POV
The drive back was silent.
Vivienne in the front seat, wrapped in Lorenzo's jacket, staring out the window. Tanaka in the back, hands cuffed, Dante sitting beside him like a stone. And me in the third row, Katya's head in my lap, her blood on my hands.
She'd stopped bleeding by the time we hit the main road. But she wouldn't wake up.
"Katya." I touched her face. "Katya, open your eyes."
Nothing.
"She's breathing," Lorenzo said from the front. "Steady."
"That's not enough."
He didn't answer.
He knew.
---
The mansion was chaos when we arrived.
Doctors. Guards. Marta running with towels. Lorenzo carried Vivienne inside—she was conscious but swaying—and I carried Katya.
I didn't let anyone else touch her.
The medical team set up in the guest room—the same room where Vivienne had been chained. I laid Katya on the bed and stepped back only when the doctor pushed me.
"She has a concussion," the doctor said. "Broken rib. Possible internal bleeding. We need to run tests."
"Then run them."
"You need to wait outside."
"No."
"Mr. Volkov—"
"I said no."
The doctor looked at Dante. Dante looked at me. Then Dante nodded.
"Let him stay."
I stood against the wall and watched them work on her. Watched them stitch the cut above her eye. Watched them wrap her ribs. Watched them shine lights in her eyes and ask her questions she couldn't answer because she was still unconscious.
Three hours.
That's how long it took for her to open her eyes.
---
KATYA POV
The ceiling was white.
Not my ceiling. Not the guest room. Somewhere else.
I tried to move. My ribs screamed.
"Don't."
Nico's voice. From the chair beside the bed.
I turned my head. He was sitting there, elbows on his knees, hands clasped. His knuckles were bruised. His eyes were red.
"You're awake," he said. Flat. Not a question.
"What happened?"
"You almost died."
I blinked. "Tanaka—"
"Is in the basement. Lorenzo is with him." He stood. Walked to the window. His back was to me. "You almost died, Katya."
"I'm fine."
He turned.
I'd never seen that look on his face before. Not anger. Something worse.
Terror.
"You're fine?" He laughed. It was hollow. "You have a concussion. A broken rib. You lost enough blood that the doctor considered a transfusion. You were unconscious for three hours. And you're fine?"
I sat up. Slowly. My ribs ached.
"Nico—"
"No." He walked to the bed. Leaned over me. "You don't get to 'Nico' me. You don't get to smile and pretend this was nothing. You stole a car. You broke through a guarded gate. You drove straight into a trap set by a man who's been hunting Vivienne for months. And you fought. With your bare hands. Against armed men."
"I was trying to help her."
"You were trying to die."
His voice cracked.
I'd never heard Nico's voice crack.
"Do you have any idea what it was like?" He straightened. Ran a hand through his hair. "Dante got the alert. We saw the gate breach. We got in the car and drove. And all I could think was—she's already dead. She's already dead. I'm going to find her body in a ditch."
"But you didn't."
"Because we got lucky." He slammed his hand against the wall. The photograph rattled. "Because Lorenzo drives like a man possessed. Because Tanaka wanted Vivienne alive, so he didn't just shoot you both on sight. Luck, Katya. Not skill. Not planning. Luck."
I didn't answer.
He was right.
"I told you," he continued, quieter now. "I told you to stay in your room. I told you not to get involved. I told you she wasn't your responsibility."
"She's my friend."
"She's not worth your life."
I stood. Ignored the pain.
"Don't," I said. "Don't you dare tell me who's worth what."
He stepped closer. Close enough that I could feel his breath.
"You almost died."
"I know."
"You almost left me."
That hit.
Harder than any punch.
"Nico—"
"I can't do that again." His voice was barely a whisper. "I can't watch them carry you in, not knowing if you're going to wake up. I can't sit in a hospital chair for three hours wondering if I should call a priest. I can't."
I reached for his face. He caught my wrist.
"You're not seeing her anymore."
I froze. "What?"
"Vivienne. You're not going near her. Not until Tanaka is dead and this is over."
"You can't—"
"I can." His grip tightened. Not enough to hurt. Enough to make a point. "Lorenzo will back me. Dante will back me. The guards will have orders. You try to go to her room, they stop you. You try to leave the estate, they stop you. You try to fight again, I'll chain you to this bed myself."
I stared at him.
"You're locking me up."
"I'm keeping you alive."
"You're a mad man."
He didn't flinch. Instead, he stepped closer, took my face in both hands, and pressed his forehead to mine.
"Yes," he whispered. "I am. I'm mad with the thought of losing you. I'm mad enough to lock every door, break every rule, become every nightmare you've ever had—as long as you're still breathing at the end of it."
I couldn't speak.
"You want to call me mad?" He pulled back just enough to look at me. "Fine. I'm mad. I'm insane. I'm the man who will burn the world down before he lets you die in a ditch for someone else's war."
My throat closed.
"Nico—"
"No." He released my face. Stepped back. "Stay in this room. Marta will bring you food. The doctor will check on you. And when this is over—when Tanaka is dead and Vivienne is safe—I'll open the door myself."
"You mean you'll unlock the cage."
"I mean I'll let you go back to her. When it's safe." He walked to the door. "Until then, you stay alive. Even if you hate me for it."
"Nico."
He stopped. Didn't turn.
"I almost died because I chose to. Not because Vivienne asked me. Not because I was careless. Because I saw a chance to get her out, and I took it. I'd do it again."
He was quiet for a long time.
Then: "I know."
"And you'd still stop me."
He turned his head, just enough that I could see his profile.
"Every time. Because I'd rather be the mad man you hate than the one who buries you."
He left.
The lock turned.
I sat down on the bed, stared at the door, and realized—
I understood Vivienne now.
Better than I ever had.
Because love, when it was afraid, looked exactly like a cage.
---
NICO POV — Hallway
I leaned against the wall outside her door and listened to her breathe.
Lorenzo appeared at the end of the hall.
"She's banned from seeing Vivienne," I said.
"Good."
I looked up. "Good?"
"Hate keeps them alive." He walked closer. "Vivienne hates me. She's still breathing."
I stared at the door.
"I'd rather lock her up than bury her."
Lorenzo stared at me knowingly, then patted my shoulder.
"Then you're doing it right," he said, and walked away.
I stayed there until the sun came up.
And every hour that passed, I heard her shift in bed.
She was awake too.
Hating me.
Good.
At least she was alive.
---