The drive back from Rhett's house should have been peaceful. East Austin's tree-lined streets gave way to downtown's familiar chaos, but my hands wouldn't stop trembling on the steering wheel. Not from fear—from something else entirely. The memory of his thumb brushing behind my ear made my skin burn.

My phone buzzed through the car speakers, Derek's name flashing on the dashboard display. I almost declined the call, but curiosity won.

"You went to HIS house? Are you out of your fucking mind?" His voice cracked through the speakers like shattered glass, so sharp I flinched.

"I was working. A commission." I kept my voice level, professional.

"Bullshit." The word came out strangled. "I saw the TikTok. I know who lives on that street. You went to a fucking drug dealer's house?"

My blood went cold. Derek had been tracking me. Find My Friends—I'd forgotten we still shared locations. He'd seen exactly where I'd been for the past three hours.

"Derek—"

"Do you have any idea what you've done? What people are going to think? Jesus Christ, Sloane, I'm trying to protect you from yourself here."

The word 'protect' hit me like a slap. "I don't need your protection."

"You need somebody's protection if you're stupid enough to walk into a cartel house alone!"

I hung up.

My hands were shaking harder now, gripping the wheel until my knuckles went white. Not because Derek was right—but because he wasn't entirely wrong. I had walked into a dangerous world tonight. The question burning in my chest wasn't whether I should have done it.

It was why I wanted to do it again.

---

The next morning brought Austin's typical September heat, the kind that made the asphalt shimmer like water. I'd barely unlocked the studio door when I spotted Derek across the street, leaning against his BMW with a bouquet of white lilies in his hands.

White lilies. The flowers I'd told him a dozen times reminded me of funerals.

He crossed the street with the confident stride of a man who'd never been told no and meant it. The lilies looked expensive, probably from that pretentious florist on South First that charged fifty dollars for arrangements that died in three days.

"Sloane." He said my name like a prayer, all soft edges and wounded sincerity. "Can we talk?"

I propped the studio door open with my hip, not inviting him in but not slamming it in his face either. "You're talking."

"I made a mistake." He held out the flowers like an offering. "One mistake. And you run to some criminal? That's not who you are, Sloane."

"How would you know who I am?" The words came out sharper than I'd intended. "You've spent three years telling me who I should be."

His face crumpled with practiced hurt. Derek had perfected the art of looking wounded when he didn't get his way. "I love you. Everything I do is because I love you."

"You love controlling me. There's a difference."

"This isn't you talking." He stepped closer, and I caught a whiff of his cologne—too heavy, too sweet. "This is whatever poison that man put in your head. You're not thinking clearly."

"I'm thinking clearly for the first time in years."

Derek's mask slipped for just a moment, revealing something uglier underneath. "Really? Because from where I'm standing, it looks like you're having some kind of breakdown. Running to criminals, throwing away everything we built together."

"We didn't build anything together. You built a cage and convinced me it was a home."

The words hung between us like a challenge. Derek's jaw tightened, and when he spoke again, his voice carried a different edge—sharper, more calculated.

"You can't survive without me, Sloane. You know that, right?" He gestured at the studio with the flowers, the movement dismissive. "This little art project of yours? You can't even afford next month's rent. Without me, you have nothing."

The familiar shame tried to crawl up my throat, but something had changed. Maybe it was the memory of Rhett's fingers in my hair, or the way he'd looked at my art like it mattered. Maybe it was just exhaustion from three years of being made to feel small.

"Watch me," I said.

Derek's face darkened. He stepped forward, reaching for my wrist. "Don't be stupid. You know I'm right. You always come back because you know—"

That's when I noticed the black Escalade.

It was parked across the street, windows tinted so dark they looked like mirrors. I'd seen it when I'd arrived this morning but hadn't thought much of it—Austin was full of expensive cars. But now, watching Derek's face go pale as he followed my gaze, I realized it had been there all along.

Watching.

The driver's door opened with deliberate slowness. A man stepped out—tall, broad-shouldered, wearing a black suit despite the heat. He didn't hurry across the street. The measured pace was somehow more threatening than running would have been.

Derek's grip on my wrist loosened.

"Ms. Avery." The man's voice was professionally neutral, but his eyes—cold, assessing—never left Derek's face. "Mr. Caraveo wants to know if the tattoo needs a touch-up session. He's free tonight."

It wasn't about the tattoo. We all knew it wasn't about the tattoo.

Derek dropped his hand entirely, taking a step back. The expensive flowers scattered across the sidewalk, white petals already wilting in the heat.

"I see." Derek's voice was tight with barely controlled rage. "So that's how it is."

The man in the suit said nothing, just stood there like a wall of quiet menace. His stillness was more effective than any threat.

Derek looked between him and me, and I saw the exact moment his wounded-lover act transformed into something more dangerous. His eyes went flat, calculating.

"You're going to regret this, Sloane." His voice dropped to barely above a whisper. "You have no idea what you're getting into."

Then he was gone, walking back to his BMW with quick, angry strides. The engine roared to life, and he peeled away from the curb with the kind of dramatic flair that would have embarrassed me six months ago.

Now it just looked pathetic.

The man in the suit watched until Derek's car disappeared around the corner, then turned back to me with something that might have been approval.

"The offer stands," he said simply, then walked back to the Escalade.

I stood there on the sidewalk, surrounded by scattered white petals and the lingering scent of Derek's cologne, watching the black car pull away. My phone buzzed in my pocket.

Unknown number. Not Rhett—I'd memorized his contact by now.

The message was a photo: me, standing at Rhett's front door last night, the timestamp clearly visible on what looked like security footage. Below it, a single line of text that made my blood turn to ice water:

*The Caraveo family destroys everything it touches. Ask his last girlfriend what happened to her.*

My hand tightened around the phone until the edges bit into my palm. I looked up at the empty street, suddenly aware of how exposed I was standing here. How many people were watching? How many cameras?

I thought about calling Rhett, but my thumb hovered over his number without dialing. What did I actually know about him? That he was dangerous, that he had money, that he made my pulse race in ways that probably meant trouble.

That might not be enough to trust him with whatever game I'd just walked into.

But as I stood there, staring at the anonymous threat on my phone screen, I realized something that should have terrified me:

I didn't want to walk away.

I wanted to know what had happened to his last girlfriend.

And I wanted to prove I was different.

I didn't knock.

The security guard at Rhett's gate started his practiced speech about appointments, but I cut him off by shoving my phone screen in his face. The surveillance photo stared back at us—me, standing at Rhett's front door, timestamp and all.

"Tell your boss someone is sending me surveillance photos," I said.

Five minutes later, I was being escorted through corridors I hadn't seen before, deeper into the house where the warm wood and soft lighting gave way to something harder. More businesslike. The man leading me—not the same one from yesterday—moved with the kind of quiet efficiency that suggested violence was always an option.

Rhett's office hit me like a slap of cold air. Everything about it screamed control—the massive dark wood desk, three monitors displaying what looked like security feeds, an abstract painting on the wall that probably cost more than my car. This wasn't the relaxed man who'd let me tattoo him. This was someone else entirely.

He looked up when I entered, and for a split second, I saw something flicker across his face. Relief, maybe. Or surprise that I'd actually come.

"Show me," he said without preamble.

I handed him my phone. He read the message, his expression never changing, but I watched his knuckles go white around the device.

"Salazar," he said, like he was confirming a chess move he'd already anticipated.

The name hung in the air between us, heavy with implications I didn't understand. "Who is Salazar?"

"Someone who thinks you're leverage now." He set my phone on the desk with deliberate care. "Someone who's about to learn they're wrong."

The casual way he said it—like he was discussing the weather—made my stomach clench. "What does that mean?"

Rhett stood and moved to the window, his hands clasped behind his back. For a moment, he looked older, weighted down by something I couldn't see.

"The Caraveo family and the Salazar family have been fighting over territory for three generations," he said. "You were seen at my house. Now they think you matter to me."

"Do I?" The question slipped out before I could stop it.

He turned, and the look he gave me was so intense it felt like being x-rayed. "That's the problem. You do."

My heart hammered against my ribs. "I should never have come here."

"I should never have let you come here." His voice carried something that might have been regret. "But here we are."

The word 'let' hit me wrong, scraping against every independent instinct I had. "You didn't LET me do anything. I drove myself here. Both times."

Something shifted in his expression—approval, maybe, or recognition. "You did. And now someone wants to hurt you because of me."

He moved back to the desk, leaning against it with his arms crossed. The position should have looked casual, but there was nothing relaxed about the way he watched me.

"So now you have two choices," he said. "Walk away and hope they lose interest, or let me handle it. But if I handle it, you stay where I can see you."

"What does that mean?"

"My penthouse downtown. Just until this blows over." His voice was matter-of-fact, like he was discussing a business arrangement. "I'll set up a tattoo space for you there. You keep working. You keep your independence. But you stay where my people can protect you."

I stared at him. "You want me to move in with you."

"I want you alive."

The blunt honesty of it hit me like a physical blow. "And what's the catch?"

"The catch is me."

The admission hung between us, loaded with promise and threat in equal measure. I could feel the weight of the decision pressing down on me, the way my life was balanced on the edge of this moment.

"No," I said.

I turned toward the door, needing space to think, needing air that didn't smell like cedar and danger. But before I could reach the handle, his hand slammed against the wood above my head, the sound echoing through the room like a gunshot.

I spun around, my back pressed against the door, and found him inches away. His other hand came up to brace against the wood beside my head, caging me in without touching me. The heat radiating from his body made the air between us feel electric.

"I am not asking because I think you're weak," he said, his voice dropping to barely above a whisper. "I'm asking because the last person the Salazars used to send a message... they sent her back in pieces."

My breath caught in my throat. The words hit me like ice water, washing away the heat of anger and leaving something colder behind. Fear, yes, but also a terrible understanding of what world I'd stumbled into.

His hand moved from the door to hover beside my face—not touching, but close enough that I could feel the warmth of his palm. The gesture was gentle despite the violence in his words, and somehow that made it more devastating.

"Say yes," he whispered.

"To what?" My voice came out breathier than I'd intended.

"To everything."

I looked up into his eyes—gray like storm clouds, like the sky before lightning strikes—and felt the ground shift beneath my feet. If I said yes, my carefully controlled life would spiral completely off its axis. If I said yes, there would be no going back to the woman I'd been a week ago.

If I said yes—

His phone rang.

The sound cut through the tension like a blade. Rhett's jaw tightened, but he didn't move away from me as he answered.

"What."

I watched his face change as he listened, watched the man who'd been inches from kissing me transform into something cold and deadly. The temperature in the room seemed to drop ten degrees.

"Where," he said. Just one word, but it carried the weight of an avalanche.

He hung up and looked at me, and I saw something in his expression that made my blood turn to ice.

"Your ex-boyfriend just walked into a Salazar bar and started asking questions about me," he said. "He's trying to be a hero. He's going to get himself killed."