Page 69 of Zorro

Then came the one that broke her breath into shivers.

I’d really like to have dinner with you.

Her stomach growled. As if answering before her brain could. A low, aching noise that rolled through her like surrender. She looked down at herself. Still in the shorts and tee she’d put on after the Welcome, carefully hanging up the gorgeous outfit that Pippa had been so kind to offer her. She looked in the mirror. Her hair was a mess. Her makeup smudged, her eyes gritty and sooty from mascara.

Yet, for the first time in what felt like forever, she was so…hungry.

Not just for food.

For him.

For laughter. For lightness. For someone who saw the woman in her and didn’t flinch.

There was more as she scrolled, her heart heavy, but light at the same time.

I’ll be back soon. I hope you’re figuring things out. Just…know I’m still here. Thinking about you. Nothing you say to me will change how I feel about you.

She rose slowly, like her legs had turned to water. Her thumb hovered. Then the last one lit the screen. Especially the things that happened when I wasn’t exactly aware.

Her hand trembled. She set the phone down as if it were going to reveal all her secrets.

Outside, the lights of Rio glimmered like scattered constellations, their reflections threading across the sea. The keycard was still in her pocket. She pulled it free. Turned it over once. Twice. It no longer felt like guilt. It felt like permission. Desire. Choice.

She rose and walked to the bathroom, her limbs unsteady, her pulse rising. The clothes on her skin suddenly felt foreign. Like a second life she hadn’t consented to keep wearing.

She peeled them off with deliberate hands, every movement an unspooling of ghosts. The blouse stuck to her ribs. The skirt fell in a soft whisper. Her bra unclasped like an unspoken goodbye. Her underwear last, wet from sweat and false grief and the night that had undone her.

Then she stepped into the shower. Turning the water hot, she let it burn.

She scrubbed her arms first. Then her chest. Her neck. Her scalp. She washed Rob from her skin. All of it. All of him and his false love, his lies, his hubris, and his ego. The myth she’d foolishly believed swirled down the drain. The man she’d tried to preserve like glass but had already broken inside.

She washed him away.

When she lifted her face into the spray, the tears that fell were cleansing, a key into a lock…release.

After the shower, she was sick with everything she had done. All of it. The way she’d treated him, his team. She’d dealt with Rob, but the fear lingered, and it was difficult to overcome a life of it from the moment she realized her parents never saw her, only her goodness.

But she had hungered…she had wanted. Wanting had gotten her Rob. Wanting had made her ignore the subtle cruelties. The small, public humiliations. The choices she’d told herself were compromises for the greater good. He was admired, she’d whispered. He’s principled. He’s safe.

But he hadn’t been any of those things. She knew it. Somewhere beneath the need to prove her goodness, she’d known Rob Quinn had resented her from the moment she surpassed him. That he’d needed her muted to feel powerful. She’d let him because to walk away would have made her selfish. Would have made her wrong. Would have made her…less good.

Everly could survive a loveless marriage. She could survive grief. But she could not survive the idea that maybe she hadn’t been good. Not when it was all she had left. That was her lie. Her prison. That to feel deeply, to want wildly, to want a man who was chaos in motion and tenderness beneath muscle meant she had to open her cage and walk out.

So she didn’t go to Zorro because she was afraid of what it meant if she did. Not afraid of him, but afraid of the part of herself that might never want to leave. Maybe most damning of all?

She knew she was hurting him. She could feel it in every unread text. Every soft knock. Every Talk to me.

She hated that this was still part of her, and it was keeping her rooted instead of going to find him. If she did, she wouldn’t just fall into him.

She’d fall apart. So she stayed in the quiet. Not punishing herself anymore. But not forgiving herself yet either. Somewhere between the ache and the answer. The keycard still sat on the table.

Waiting.

So was she. But not for permission anymore. For peace. For the voice in her chest to quiet. For the fear to stop masquerading as caution. For the ache to feel like want instead of punishment.

She didn’t get all the way there. But she got close enough to reach for her phone. Her fingers hovered. Then typed. Slowly. Deliberately. When she hit send, her breath caught, but she didn’t take it back. She set the phone down, turned toward the window, and watched the lights of Rio ripple across the water. Outside, the night waited.

Naked, she walked to the chair where she’d draped his tee. She picked it up and brought it to her nose, breathing deep. She closed her eyes, her throat cramping. Was she brave enough to face this fear of wanting so hard, she might get lost in it? Lost in him? Her hands trembled and she almost set the shirt back down, but at the last moment before her will gave out, she pulled it defiantly over her head, went to the bed.

---