This time, Zara woke up with full energy. Her eyes did not sting when she opened them to the sober sunlight that was escaping from the windows blocked by curtains, leaving an orangish hue right. She looked to her right and saw the IV that stood there but was no longer inside her arm. She craned her neck and looked at the thick blanket all over her. Her body ached less and her jaw seemed to be healing.

Healing.

Her eyes opened wide.

She started to get up but an invisible force of her own tiredness pushed her down. She needed her arm to get up but her left hand was numb. She pulled the covers off of it and stared at the pearl white cast that was holding her hand together.

She remembered what had happened.

Using her right hand, she held her lower jaw and winced at that contact. It still hurt but was healing up. The bruises on her arms were also healing. That's when she remembered her head.

Her right hand trembled as it travelled to the back of her head.

Stitches.

"Agh," She winced once again.

Bravery had its own price to be paid.

She tried to get off the bed but her stomach hurt, restricting her getting up. She groaned as she lifted her shirt and looked at her bruised ribs. Then she remembered the clear noise of something breaking.

She had a broken rib.

Zara used her right hand as support once again and fell backwards, hitting the soft heavenly pillows that felt really comfortable against the pain of the stitches on her head. She saw a monitor next to her and a button attached to it. Making her theories about what it was for, she pressed it.

The door opened after 40 seconds that she counted and in walked Adrian, no impact on him whatsoever, still looking like a model out of a Hugo Boss commercial. Following him was Marvin and the cook, Melanie.

"How are you feeling?" Adrian asked as he sat down at the left side of the bed at the end.

Zara tried to get up, making him help her. Melanie had walked around at this time and was adjusting the pillows behind Zara's back so that they would be a support. But Adrian's touch made Zara's heart race faster. She blamed all the morphine that she must be under and all the adrenaline that she hadn't used up.

"No 'good morning', I see." She joked, making him smile. "What happened?"

"The Ferraras got to you. They had denied the first kidnapping but sent a bounty last night." He brought out a phone from his pocket and showed Zara a photo of her with the caption 'WANTED'. "You're famous right now."

She gaped at him. "But I haven't done anything!"

"Welcome to the mafia."

She shook her head repeatedly. "This is not fair. I can't be wanted by mafias! What did I ever do to you people?"

Silence took over the two of them. Zara glanced up at Marvin, who simply bowed his head at her once, before eyeing the cook to leave the room to leave them in privacy. Zara looked at Adrian looking at the cast in her left hand, which made her look at it.

"Why didn't you leave me?" She asked, still keeping her gaze on the cast and missing the fact that Adrian tried to search for her eyes to know what she was thinking. "You could have been free of the headache that I am. I'm only a liability to you and now that there is a bounty over my head....why didn't you just leave me?"

Adrian couldn't imagine what would have happened if he had done it. But how could he tell her that while Zara was wishing that she had been left there, he couldn't have left her? She did not know how her life was going to go from then on. Could she trust the person in front of her after he saved her life?

"I don't know."

Her head jerked up to look at him staring at her. "What?"

"I don't know." He repeated. "I got an alert that you had left the premises, which made me search for you. I don't want to see you hurt, Zara." He clenched his jaw as he turned his gaze to the wall in front of him because no matter what he told her, he was still a liar. "Even if you don't believe me."

"But why? You don't know me. We've never even met-"

"Do you think I could live with myself if the Ferraras got to you?" This time, his gaze on her was much softer than she would have expected. "They think that you are important to me because I came to the bar. I sat at the counter and they had been keeping an eye on me the entire time. They can do anything if they got to you....and I wouldn't be able to stop them."

The code.

The council.

The pact.

The words were already taking over their conversation.

"Why were you there....that day?"

He shook his head as he rested his elbows on his thighs, leaning forward in his seat facing the wall. "To finish a deal."

She nodded while her lips trembled. She wanted to cry. She wanted to shout at him to let her go. But he had saved her after all. "What about my aunt?"

"We're still finding her. She will be safe, don't worry." But there was a certain uncertainty in his voice. It was the same one that he had had when he asked her if she lived with her aunt, as if he didn't know the answer to it. "My actions caused this," He stood up. "So let me correct it."

He started to walk towards the doors when two words from Zara's mouth made him stop for just a second. "Thank you." He glanced at her over his shoulders. "For saving me." 

He nodded before going his way, hiding the soft smile that his face now had.

He had saved her because she thought that he was the saviour in her story. And perhaps, that was for the best.

Because if she knew who he really was, she would not look at him twice.

He was the leader of the Cardenas and nobody could change that.

Not even himself.

*****
He's so dramatic and for what?