She leaves Tiago's room with Valerie.

I can't help but chuckle at that, as painful as laughing is right now. I'm happy he'd finally started using that giant rock of a head and done something about those two. He leans out of the doorframe as they kiss him each, all laughs and shit. And that dumbass waited this whole time.

I turn the corner and head to her room before he can see me. Pressing my back against her door and feeling the blinding white stab of pain in my shoulder, I let myself slide down till my ass hits the floor with a thud. Closing my eyes, I tilt my head back, feeling blood run down the back of my throat.

Footsteps. Two pairs.

Voices. Theirs.

"—figure out what's going on," Sienna says, mirthless.

"I don't think this changes our plan tonight," Valerie says in the same tone. "We just have to—"

The footsteps halt.

Silence falls.

I open my eyes.

I don't think I've ever seen either one of them so pale, though Sienna came close last night when my fucking joke of a prefrontal cortex decided to call her mother.

"Kaen?" She whispers, taking a careful step forward, holding her hand out as if to touch me... or ward me off.

"Hot Stuff," I rasp. "To what do I—"

A coughing fit overtakes me and I taste the blood that ran down my throat earlier. Every cough is a spasm like a thousand knives penetrating my chest.

"I'll go get someone," Valerie says.

"No," I glare at her. She frowns.

"Kaen," Sienna says, her outstretched hand now resting on my knee. "You need to get looked at. Something—"

"Broken nose," I say as I try to breathe through my mouth. "Bruised ribs. Dislocated right shoulder. Cuts and scrapes. Nothing you can't handle."

"Me?" She looks at Valerie and back at me. "Kaen, you need a doctor. You can't just—"

"Sienna," my eyes meet hers. "Please."

She holds her breath, pressing her mouth into a line, and whips her head to Valerie.

"Keep your phone nearby," she tells her. "I'll text you if I need anyone."

"Sienna—" I begin.

"That's the compromise," she snaps at me, glaring. "Take it before I change my mind, Kaen."

I let my head fall back against the door. "Fine."

"Let's get you up," she puts a hand under the armpit of my good shoulder.

She and Valerie get me into her room. Valerie drags Sienna's desk chair to the bathroom where she puts me down.

"I'll be on standby," Valerie says, grabbing Sienna's hand.

The other woman nods and squeezes it, "Thank you."

With one last anxious glance at me, Valerie leaves.

"What on Earth do you think you're doing?" Sienna whirls at me, hands on her hips.

"Right now?" I shift in my seat and smile at her. "Admiring the view."

She glares as she approaches. "This isn't funny, Kaen."

"Good thing I'm not joking," I grunt as she begins removing my jacket. She gets my good arm out first. I clench my teeth as she slides the thing off of my other arm. Even the slightest movement hurts like a stab in the gut. She throws my blood-crusted jacket to the floor and, hovering over my right shoulder, examines it from all angles.

"This is gonna hurt," she says as she puts a palm to my back. "But I don't think you're new to this."

"I've always admired your intellect," I smirk. She sighs as she puts her free hand on my shoulder, setting my pain receptors on fire.

"I'm gonna count to three," she says.

I nod, holding my breath.

"One—" and she pushes the thing back in.

My scream comes out as a long grunt through my gritted teeth. My vision goes white and what little food I have in me threatens to make an appearance as sheer agony travels through my nervous system.

I never get used to this.

"Two, three," she lets me go and steps before me as air hisses through my teeth with the heaving of my lungs. "That's for being so fucking stubborn. Look here."

Her fingers press to my skull on either side as she lifts my head. I look into her eyes as she feels the bridge of my nose. They're completely focused on her task.

"Can you breathe through it?" She asks.

"No," I say, heaving.

With a crack and a pain sharp enough to make my eyes leak fluid, she shifts the bridge back into place. I breathe through the pain, made less by the slowly ebbing agony of my shoulder.

"How about now?"

My lungs work hungrily as I take in the sweet air from my nostrils.

"Yeah," I exhale.

"You said your ribs are bruised?"

"Yeah," the reminder brings their pain back, however dim compared to everything else and the rush of adrenaline it all gave me. "Nothing's broken. I made sure of it."

"What do you mean you 'made sure of it'?" Her voice rises as she frowns at me. "Kaen, that's not how this works."

"Maybe not with everyone else," I meet her eyes again. "With me? It is."

"Fine," she snaps and crosses her arms. "Then explain what happened."

I sigh as much as my ribs allow me.

"Nothing happened."

Her mouth flies open to speak.

"Nothing of note," I look away from her to my jacket on the floor. "I was at my loft. You can say blowing off steam."

Her knees touch mine.

"Have you seen yourself?" She says. "I've never seen you like this. Not even after Nico."

My eyes snap to hers, too quick for her to suppress a flinch. I glare into those bright orbs as my rage threatens to douse my soul with gasoline and incinerate it all the way to hell.

"Do you think that's the worst that I could do to someone?" I can tell she doesn't recognize my voice as I say those words. "That piece of shit got off easy, Sienna."

Her throat bobs as she steps back. Her glare wavers as she takes a breath.

She's afraid of me, I realize. No, not of me—at least not more than she normally is, the way I like her to be—but for me.

"You were there all night, weren't you?" She breathes. "You were torturing someone. Who was it?"

I hold my breath as her fearful gaze morphs into a blazing hot glare.

"Kaen," she steps forward. "Who was it?"

I am many things, but I am not a liar to this woman. I'd rather hang myself with my own intestines; I'd rather burn the whole world until nothing but ash and dust remains than lie to her. But I can't answer. Not now. Not today.

"It's neither of our mothers, if that's what you're asking," I crack a smile. "I'll show you when we're done with it all."

She frowns, blinking. "Show me?"

I nod. "I left souvenirs. I think you'll appreciate them."

Her shoulders relax as she sees the sincerity in my eyes. I wanted it to be a complete surprise, but this is a compromise I can accept.

"At least tell me how you managed to break your nose and dislocate your shoulder," she says.

"Oh, that?" I stretch my newly mended shoulder. "That was later. You should've seen the other guys. All ash now."

She raises her eyebrows.

"Like I said," I look into her eyes again. "After. I'll tell you everything. I promise."

She sighs, clearly not pleased with the outcome but agreeing to it. She chews on her lower lip, the pinching of her eyebrows betraying her anxiety. She's so fucking perfect. She doesn't deserve what any of those pieces of shit have done to her. I'll never let it happen again; that, I silently swear to her.

"I'm sorry," I find myself saying. "For yesterday."

She shakes her head but her eyes soften.

"Hurting you like that was the worst thing I ever did," I say. "I wasn't thinking. I hate myself for it."

"You didn't hurt me," she holds my face in her hands.

"If I didn't call—"

"And if I didn't grab that phone none of this would've happened."

"But—"

"Kaen," she holds my gaze in her unrelenting eyes. "If you think I had the balls to call that number myself you're dead wrong. None of them would do it for me, either. It's thanks to you that I know my mother is alive."

I open my mouth to speak but she presses a finger to my lips.

"If I was afraid of that, I wouldn't have singled you out with the Liszt piece. I knew there was a chance you'd do what you did when I pointed that out. The one who hurt me isn't you; it's whoever's behind this. You've hurt many people, Kaen, as have I. But I know you'd rather burn the whole world to the ground than hurt me. Going that far for people you care about is in your nature. It's one of the things I love most about you."

My heart stops.

Maybe I'm still delirious. Maybe I'm lying somewhere in the middle of the road and this is some kind of a fever dream. Or a hallucination before death. But her eyes, her smile, her voice... they can't be just a figment of my imagination. Even my memories can't recreate her as she is right now, standing before me, saying those words.

"Sienna..." I breathe.

"Kaen, I love you," she smiles, pressing her forehead to mine. "I love you, darling."

Feeling as though I'm moving through a dream, I take her face in my hands and bring her lips to my own. She throws her arms around me as she jumps onto my lap and kisses me back. This isn't a hallucination. No, my mind can't fake this. This is real. This is fucking real.

"No one," I pant as I hold her close, the pain radiating in my chest a pale comparison to what I feel toward this human in my arms. "No one on this whole fucking planet—do you hear me?—no one in this universe loves anything or anyone as much as I love you."

Before she says anything I kiss her again. I take her in with my mouth, engulf her, breathe her scent of last night's sweat and sex, and hold her to me until I feel her heart beating against mine.

I know my brothers love her. I know Valerie does, too. And, though their feelings are the only possible contenders, there's no competition. No amount of love in the world can compare to what I feel toward her. She is everything to me. I've been consumed by her the moment I met her. I live for her; I'd die for her without a heartbeat's hesitation. She wouldn't approve, I know, but she can tell that to someone who gives a damn. Someone who loves her less than I do.

"Kaen," she breathes into my mouth, "you're barely breathing."

"I don't care."

She breaks away from me, lifting off of my rib cage—allowing it to expand less painfully—and frowning at me.

"I do," she says. "Wait here."

She turns the bath's faucet until the stream begins steaming.

"Jesse drew me a bath when I was stressed the first day," she says as she uncaps a bottle of something purple. "Helped me relax."

"I don't need to relax, Sienna, just need to get clean," I say as she pours it into the tub. "We don't have time—"

"Kaen," she snaps as the air turns to lavender. "You've been up all night doing what equates to manual labour and you've injured yourself. You're exhausted. You're running on adrenaline. You will crash soon and you need sleep."

"I know how this works, Sienna," but I must admit the enticing scent is already beginning to change my mind. "Not my first rodeo. I'll be fine."

She puts the bottle back and puts her hands on her hips. "And if I go in with you?"

A lazy smirk stretches over my face. "Well, if you're offering..."

She shakes her head, chuckling. "So predictable."

She helps me undress and get in. The tension in my muscles evaporates as soon as the hot water hits them. I close my eyes, feeling myself dissolve with the lavender bubbles around me. A few moments later, I feel her form float beside me. I wrap my arm around her, holding her close as she lays back.

"Nice, isn't it?" she murmurs.

"Mhm," I crack my eyes open and find her among the bubbles in water turned red from blood. "Especially with this view."

She rolls her eyes, smiling.

I smile back, but something gnaws at me. Something I don't want my mind going back to, but I can't help it, especially not after she finally admitted her love for me.

"Sienna." I hear the pain in my voice as I say her name. Her eyes snap to mine with that pain reflected in them. I lick my lips.

"What I'm about to say," I breathe—easier now with the tendons around my rib cage relaxed, "Isn't conducive to relaxation. But I have to say it. Get it off my chest, if you wanna call it that. Please let me."

She purses her lips, sighing. Her eyes go soft as she nods. I feel my heart hammer in my ears and my throat constrict, wishing I had a cigarette right now. Breathing, I will my voice not to fail.

"Jesse didn't tell you everything my mother said. He did it for me. He knows what talking about it does to me."

I pause, the words threatening to rip my throat apart. A part of me expected her to take the pause and say some bullshit about me not having to talk about it, but she doesn't. She knows what I asked her, and she understands. That just makes me fall in love with her even more.

"When I was a kid," I begin with a sigh. "My mother would sell me to men in our syndicate."

It was so simple, saying this, yet it felt like ripping my soul apart.

Sienna's hand squeezes my thigh underwater. I hold onto it like it's the edge of a cliff from which I'd otherwise plummet to my death.

"My father didn't know, or so I thought," I barrel through before I dare stop myself. "She'd be so good to me. She taught me everything I know that isn't killing. Languages, music, politics, everything. My father would be out for work often, so it was just her and me most of the time. She was the closest human to me. I loved her. I thought she loved me."

My next breath shakes, but I don't pause. If I pause, I won't start again.

"But she also pimped me out like I was some kind of whore-for-hire. Every fucking week. At first, I thought it was just something everyone had to do. Then I got older and realized it wasn't. I told her I didn't want to do it anymore, I told her how much it hurt every time. She said it was something I had to do. That sometimes we have to do things we don't want to. Things that hurt."

I pause, then, only for the briefest moment to catch my breath.

Or so was my intention, because I can't continue. Not with my breath rattling in my aching chest; not with my vision going black at the edges; not with my throat seizing up like I'm going into anaphylactic shock.

A hand touches my face. It turns my head to the most beautiful woman on earth, and she puts her forehead to mine. She doesn't say anything. She doesn't have to. I feel the strength she gives me in her touch alone. When I pull back, I find my breath steadier, my throat looser. And I continue.

"When we moved to Hawaii, I thought it would stop, but it didn't. I met my brothers through some weapons business they had with us there." I feel the smallest of smiles stretch my lips. "I looked up to Elijah. We were the same age and he was in charge of a fucking empire in the making, while I was just some lackey with a penchant for cruelty as a coping mechanism for being used as a sex doll."

Cupping some bubbles in my hand like a child, I watch them pop.

"I gravitated to him, we'd spend more and more time together. With all of my brothers, but him especially. It didn't take long for him to get to the bottom of what's been happening to me, and he demanded I defect. I said it'll tank the business in Hawaii and make him more enemies, he said he didn't give a shit. He was more impulsive back then."

I hear her expel air out of her nose and turn to see a smile form on her lips.

"Hard to believe, I know," I look up at the ceiling, propping the back of my skull on the headrest behind me. "I was impulsive too, though, like now. It wouldn't have been out of character for me to do as he wanted. The truth is, I was terrified. My brothers respected my decision, but I think they knew. They said I'd always have a place here if I changed my mind.

"On a trip back home, the bigshots of our syndicate, my parents included, were massacred in a meeting house. I fled as soon as I found out and joined the Hydra."

Sitting up, ribs aching, I look at the blood in the water around me.

"But my mother survived. She told me she orchestrated everything. That she did it for me. That she was forced to sell me and that it was the only way to get me out. That my father wasn't better than any of the so-called men who raped me over and over. And that he did it to others." I meet Sienna's eyes. "Jesse told you everything else. That she meant to capture me and you. That everything was planned to lure me in. She never told me why."

I can see the million questions in her eyes. The doubt, the sorrow, and the love she holds in that solid gaze.

"Do you believe her?" She asks. "Do you believe she did it for you?"

I close my eyes and take a stabbing sigh, wishing the weight on my soul would dissolve like the bubbles in this bath.

"I want to," I say truthfully. "I want to believe there was a reason she had to do what she did to me. But I don't know."

Opening my eyes, I see her gaze soften.

"Not that it matters," I say. "It doesn't change what she did."

"No," she says, hand to my face. "But it can help us understand her."

I nod, looking into those eyes pouring out everything she doesn't have to say. They turn down, narrowing slightly.

"What is it?" I ask her.

"She said something to me. It slipped my mind with everything else going on but..."

"What did she say?"

"That history repeats itself. It was just before she started humming Liszt. What does that mean?"

I look past her, considering.

"I don't know. Something to do with your mother?"

"That's what I thought, too. But maybe not. Maybe it's your past and—" she cuts herself off as she meets my eyes again, exhaling. "You know what? Forget it right now."

I frown. "Sienna, if it's important—"

"What's important is that you hear this," she holds my face in her hands. "You're stronger than your past. I want you to know that."

Looking into those eyes, a green so bright they look grey, I nod, and she brings her lips to mine. With the way she kisses me, I feel something lift, and my mind finally falls prey to the hot water and lavender scent as my muscles have. It drifts, lost in her essence. She knows, now. And nothing has changed between us.

"I love you, Sienna," I tell her, and the smile she gives me can light up the darkest of caves.

"I love you, Kaen." She kisses me again.

She must have taken me to her bed afterwards because all I remember is waking up in it. I'm there alone, a fresh set of clothes at its foot. My ribs still ache, but the pain is dulled. The clock on my phone says it's half past two in the afternoon. Tiago's egg salad sandwich stands on the bedside next to a glass of water and a bottle of painkillers. My mind is clear, my stomach growls with hunger, my soul weighs about a ton lighter, and I smell like fucking lavender.

I eat and put my clothes on, a stubborn smile gracing my face all the while. I feel like a fucking schoolboy whose girlfriend said yes to a prom date. That smile is still there when I leave Sienna's room, but teeters on disappearing when Elijah turns the corner.

He slows when he notices me, looking me over. I brace myself for the barrage of insults coming my way.

"She told me you'd be in there," my brother says, frowning. "Where were you last night?"

Clenching my teeth, I sigh, the painkillers doing wonders for the ache in my chest. "If I tell you it's a long story, will you let it go?"

Elijah puts his face inches from mine. I can almost feel his breath as he stares at me.

Then he opens his arms and embraces me.

"I'm glad you're okay, brother" he claps me on the back.

Whatever took over him, I'm glad that it did, because my arms fly around him faster than I can stop them.

"Come on," he says, pulling away. "I'll tell you what you missed."