Ruth’s POV
I couldn’t stop replaying the museum, not the interview, not the crowd. Just Lorenzo, too calm, too smooth, too precise.
He had said everything right, made eye contact like it was a practiced art form. But something beneath it had curled wrong, I hadn’t noticed it at first. But now, it clung to me.
The next morning, I sat at my desk, trying to sketch something loose and quiet, lines that should’ve come easily. But nothing moved. My fingers hovered, tense. I reached for the silver pen he’d given me, thinking I could at least jot down a few notes.
But the second my fingers touched the cap, it surfaced. The memory, not a dream, not an image, but a moment. Lorenzo’s hand hadn’t just handed me the card. When he’d given it to me, his thumb pressed against my inner arm. Right above the pulse point, just under the edge of my sleeve.
It wasn’t suggestive, It wasn’t flirtation. It was calculated, like checking something. And I’d felt that before. Ten years old. Strapped into the back seat of a strange car, my head pressed against the window while my brother’s screams faded underwater. A man leaned over me, face blurry, breath cold. Whispered: Be quiet now.
Then his hand, right on my wrist. Thumb over pulse. Like he was making sure I was calm. Or alive. Or marked. I hadn’t spoken about that part, not to anyone. Maybe I’d buried it on purpose, maybe forgetting had been the only way to survive. But now it was back. And it made my whole body lock up. I flinched. The pen dropped from my hand, rolled off the desk, hit the floor with a sharp metallic click. I didn’t pick it up.
By late afternoon, I needed to breathe. The house felt too narrow. I pulled on my jacket and boots and walked behind the house toward the meadow trail. The wind pressed at my shoulders like it wanted to push me back inside, but I kept moving.
The trail had overgrown a little since the last rain, wet grass brushing against my thighs. It was quiet, too quiet then I felt it. A shift in the air, the unmistakable sensation of being watched. I turned, Emmett stood half-shielded behind a tangle of trees, still as bark, the dark hood pulled over his face, the mask casting his features in shadow. He didn’t move, nor speak. His silence didn’t scare me. If anything, it felt honest.
“You followed me again.” My voice was even, but the tension threaded through it.
He stepped out from the shadows slowly. “I had to make sure you were okay.”
My heartbeat jumped. “From what?”
He took a step closer, not enough to close the distance, but enough to make the intent clear. “That man. Lorenzo. He touched you.”
My pulse stumbled. “It was just a card. A handoff.”
His eyes dropped to my wrist, like he could still see it, like it was branded there. His voice was low. Sharp.
“Don’t let him touch you like that again.” The possessiveness should’ve set off alarms. It didn’t, not exactly.
“You’re watching me, Emmett.”
“Yes.”
“You’re obsessing.”
“Maybe.” His voice didn’t flinch. “But you don’t understand what he is. What men like him want.”
“And you’re different?”
He didn’t answer at first. Then, slowly, he lifted a hand. Not fast, nor demanding, just offering. His fingers hovered near mine, waiting. I didn’t move. His hand brushed my wrist, the same spot Lorenzo had touched, but the sensation wasn’t the same. Emmett didn’t check my pulse, he didn’t try to claim it. He pressed his thumb to my skin, gently, firmly. Holding, not measuring, anchoring.
“If someone wants to own you,” he said, voice close and steady, “they have to survive me first.”
I didn’t step back. My chest was tight, my thoughts spinning. Part of me wanted to run, part of me wanted to stay. When he pulled away, the heat of his touch stayed on my wrist like a bruise that hadn’t surfaced yet. Then he turned and disappeared into the trees again, not making a sound. I stood there long after he was gone, rooted to the path, my hand curled against my chest.
I didn’t know what disturbed me more, Lorenzo’s strange familiarity… Or the fact that I felt safer with the man who had been following me.