Chapter 35

**A L E X**


I turn to leave, after I have ensured that the store owner, Maria, is positively shaking with fear. I shove my gun back into its holster, fingers still twitching from the desire to put a bullet through Matt's skull, but something else is more time sensitive.

I begin to walk away, shoulders tense, mind racing with thoughts of where she could be when something flickers in my peripheral vision—a glimmer of red against the dim light of the shop. I stop. My heart clenches, an irrational thought slamming into me with the force of a truck. It can’t be. It *can’t* be. I almost convince myself it’s just a trick of the light, some ghost of a memory playing tricks on my mind. But it’s not.

I turn, slow and deliberate. Maria’s eyes follow me, wide and anxious, Matt’s too, watching me like a predator who knows his prey is about to make a fatal move. But I don’t care about either of them. My focus narrows to that spot—a bag by the counter, something red peeking out of it. Familiar. So damn familiar.

It pulls me in like gravity.

I move toward it, my hand already reaching, fingers brushing the edge of the fabric. The second I touch it, my breath catches in my throat. It’s not just any red fabric. It’s silk. Soft. Luxurious. And hauntingly familiar.

I pull it out, slow at first, then with more force, yanking the dress free. I stand there, staring at it in disbelief. Grace Miller’s red dress. The one she was wearing the last time I saw her, just hours ago, in that boutique. The same dress I had unbuttoned, carefully, cautiously, my hands trembling with the force of restraint. The dress I had buttoned back up when I forced myself to stop—to leave her untouched, despite every fibre in my being screaming for more.

And now here it is. Empty. Cold. Useless without her body filling it.

A sick feeling churns in my gut as I pinch one of the soft round buttons between my finger ad my thumb. Holding this dress in my hands feels wrong—violating almost. Without Grace Miller's skin beneath it, without the warmth of her breath matching the rhythm of my movements as I undid those buttons, the dress feels cheap. Hollow. It disgusts me. I fist the fabric, the silk slipping between my fingers as if trying to escape. But it can’t. Not anymore. It’s trapped in my grip, just like she should be.

The weight of the dress drags me back into that boutique, into the moment when her chest rose and fell beneath my hands, her scent intoxicating, her skin flushed and alive. I had her then. All of her. But I left. I turned my back for a second, and she was gone. Gone with this damn dress. Gone with my card. Gone *from me*.

My jaw clenches hard enough to hurt as I stride toward Maria, the dress bunched in my fist.

“What is this doing here?” My voice cuts through the tension, sharp and demanding.

Maria stumbles backward on her weak knees, her face draining of all colour, hands wringing together as if she could twist the truth into something less dangerous. She stammers, shaking so visibly it almost looks pitiful, but I don’t care. I’m too far gone. “I… I don’t know. I don’t know how—”

“*Don’t lie to me.*” The words snarl out of my mouth before I can stop them, each one heavier than the last. My mind is racing, heart pounding in time with the fear that’s clawing its way up my throat. If the dress is here, then Grace Miller's was here. Or if not—she could still be nearby.

But why the hell would this dress be here, off her body? The thoughts slam into me with the force of a nightmare. I don’t want to think about what this could mean—about who touched her, what they’ve done to her, where she is now.

For a brief, terrifying moment, I see red—Grace Miller's skin pale, her eyes closed, lifeless. My hand tightens around the dress as the image threatens to rip me apart. A consuming desire to murder rising inside me, and this time I do not feel the need for a gun either.

Matt steps in at the worst possible moment, his voice sliding in like the snake he is. “Stop scaring the lady, Alex,” he drawls, leaning casually against the counter like he isn’t moments away from me putting a bullet through his skull. “You’re going to make her faint.”

My fist tightens around the fabric, and I whip around, stepping closer to Matt until I can feel his breath on my face. My other hand hovers over my gun, and I’m this close to drawing it.

“Talk then, tell me what you know about her!”

The dress feels like it’s burning in my hand now, a reminder of everything that’s at stake, of everything Matt might have done, of everything he knows and won’t say. His smirk makes me sick. He knows more than he’s letting on. He has to.

“I told you, Alex, everyone knows about Grace,” he says, his voice low and taunting for the rest of the sentence except her name. Her name he takes softly, it irks Alex more. “She’s been the object of everyone’s interest. Like I said, beautiful, naive…” He leans in closer, his next words barely a whisper, but they hit me like a freight train. “*Vulnerable.*”

I snap. My gun is out before I even realize I’ve drawn it, and it’s pointed straight at Matteo’s head. My finger hovers over the trigger as fury boils in my blood. The world narrows to this moment, to this man, to his disgusting scarred smirk.

And then the door flies open, the room fills with men all armed with big guns all pointed at me. My guards rush in after Matteo’s, guns drawn, pointed directly at Matt’s security. It’s chaos—guns raised, everyone on edge, the air crackling with tension, one wrong move away from bloodshed.

I press the barrel of the gun against Matt’s forehead, hard enough that I see his smirk finally falter.

“For the last fucking time. Tell me where she is,” I growl, my voice a deadly whisper, barely controlled.

But before he can answer, before the world can explode into violence, I hear a soft voice behind me.

“I’m here.”

The sound is enough to stop my heart.