Chapter 5

The fever broke on the second day.

I woke in a private room at Mount Sinai, my throat raw and my limbs heavy as wet sand. The IV drip cast pale shadows across sterile walls. Through the window, Manhattan's skyline glittered—cold, beautiful, indifferent to the wreckage of my life.

Liz sat hunched in the chair beside me, dark circles carved beneath her eyes. "You collapsed in the parking garage. Building security found you." Her fingers tightened around mine. "God, Helia. You scared the hell out of me."

I didn't remember the drive home. Only the rain. Only the word pregnant detonating through my skull.

When I finally returned to the Maynard compound, twilight had swallowed the grounds.

And Orion was waiting at the door.

He stood beneath the portico light, still in his suit from whatever blood-soaked meeting had consumed his day. But something in his posture felt different—less rigid, almost uncertain. His gaze swept over me, cataloging the pallor of my skin, the way I gripped the doorframe.

"Where the hell have you been?" His voice was low. Softer than I'd heard it in months.

I stared at him. "Hospital."

A muscle jumped in his jaw. He stepped closer, and for one disorienting heartbeat, his hand rose toward my cheek—then dropped. "You should have called me."

Called you? The words clawed at my throat. You? The man who's been keeping Sabrina warm for weeks?

But that familiar gentleness—God, it was cruel. It dragged me back to before, when he'd trap me in dark hallways and press his mouth to my temple. When he'd growl tesoro against my pulse like I was something precious.

Before I could stop myself, the question slipped out.

"Do you remember Iceland?"

Orion went still.

"The Northern Lights." My voice cracked. "You promised to show me the most beautiful light in the world. Said you'd take me when things settled down."

Silence stretched taut between us.

Something raw flickered across his face—there and gone in a heartbeat. Then the mask slid back into place.

"Sabrina needs looking after right now." He said it flat, mechanical. "She's in a delicate condition."

The last ember in my chest guttered out.

Of course. Even now—hospital discharge papers crumpled in my pocket, two days of fever still clinging to my bones—I ranked below her. I would always rank below her.

"I understand," I said quietly.

His brow furrowed. "Helia—"

"I said I understand." I moved past him into the house, and he let me go.

That night, I dismantled our marriage piece by piece.

The jewelry box came first. Earrings from our first anniversary. A bracelet from some forgotten birthday. I lined them on the vanity like evidence at a trial. Then the photographs—us at the charity gala where he'd danced with me once before vanishing into smoke-filled backrooms; our wedding day, his smile tight while I beamed like a fool who believed in fairy tales.

My fingers found the sapphire necklace last.

I held it to the lamplight, watching blue fire dance across the facets. Orion had clasped it around my throat on my eighteenth birthday, his breath warm against my ear, his body solid behind mine.

"Sapphires mean forever," he'd murmured. "I'll always protect you, piccola. Always."

I set it on the nightstand beside the divorce papers. Let him find them together. Let him wonder—for once in his goddamn life—what it felt like to be the one left behind.

The grandfather clock struck two when I heard him in the corridor.

Heavy footsteps. Uneven. The sharp clink of crystal against wood.

I was pulling the last of my clothes from the closet when the bedroom door swung open.

Orion filled the frame—tie loosened, hair wrecked, the smell of bourbon rolling off him in waves. His eyes found me in the half-dark, glassy and unfocused.

"The hell are you doing?"

I kept folding. Didn't look up.

Three unsteady strides and he was on me. His hand closed around my wrist, spinning me hard. My shoulder blades hit the wall, his body crowding close, caging me in. Heat poured off his skin. I could count his heartbeats through his shirt.

"You're not leaving." The words slurred, desperate. "You don't get to leave me."

His forehead dropped against mine. I could taste the whiskey on his breath, feel the rough scrape of his jaw. One hand flattened against the wall by my head; the other slid to my hip, thumb pressing into the hollow there.

For one terrible moment, I wanted to melt into him. To pretend this was real. That he was here for me.

His lips grazed the corner of my mouth.

"Stay," he breathed. "I need you to stay... Sabrina—"

The name shattered everything.

I shoved him hard. He stumbled back, confusion clouding his face, and I realized he didn't even know. Didn't know whose name had spilled from his lips while he held me.

"Open your eyes." My voice came out shredded. "Look at me, Orion. Who the hell am I?"

He blinked. Swayed. His mouth opened, but nothing came out.

I stepped around him and walked out of the bedroom.

The tears came in the hallway—silent, scalding. I pressed my palm hard against my mouth and kept moving. Past the portraits of Maynard patriarchs who'd built this empire on blood and silence. Past the study where I'd tricked him into signing our end. Past the foyer where I'd once believed I could belong.

At dawn, I stood in the driveway with a single suitcase.

Michael was already there, leaning against a black sedan, arms crossed. He didn't ask questions—just gave me a slow nod and something that looked almost like respect.

"Take care of yourself out there," he said quietly.

"Take care of him." I didn't know why I said it. "He's going to need someone watching his back."

Michael's jaw tightened, but he opened the car door without another word.

The compound rose behind me, all stone and shadow and old money. I slid into the backseat and kept my eyes forward as the gate swung open.

The car pulled onto the main road. Manhattan's skyline emerged through the windshield, soft-edged in morning fog.

In five hours, I'd be airborne. In ten, I'd land in Chicago, and Helia Maynard would cease to exist.

The sunflower beneath my collarbone throbbed with each heartbeat.

I pressed my palm flat against it—felt the raised edges, the fresh scar tissue—and let my head fall back against the seat.

Goodbye to the photographs where only one of us was smiling.

Goodbye to the mansion that never felt like home.

Goodbye, Orion.