Page 25 of Untamed

I keep my eyes cast down, focusing on the food, pretending I don’t feel the weight of his stare like a brand across my skin. I’m halfway through forcing another bite down when his voice cuts through the quiet, low, sharp, and completely unapologetic.

“You could’ve fucking died last night.”

I freeze, fork halfway to my mouth. The words land harder than they should. Like a hard slap across the face. No softness. No pity. Just raw, brutal fact.

I lick my lips as I set the fork down carefully, my fingers trembling just a little.

“I know,” I whisper.

Ares pushes off the counter, moving closer, hands braced on the island across from me. “No,” he says, voice rough. “I don’t think you do, bambina. You jumped into a pool, fully clothed, intoxicated. If I hadn’t heard you...if I hadn’t found you—” He breaks off, jaw grinding like it physically pains him to finish the sentence. “—you wouldn’t be sitting here right now.”

The air between us hums with tension, thick and stifling.

I swallow hard, lifting my gaze to his. There’s no hatred there. No disgust or anger. I don’t really know what I see in his dark eyes, if I’m being honest.

“I’m sorry,” I murmur, my voice wavering.

For a second, he just stares at me, breathing hard through his nose.

Then he exhales, shoving a hand roughly through his tousled hair.

“Don’t be sorry,” he mutters. “Just don’t be stupid like that again.”

I nod quickly, blinking against the sudden sting behind my eyes.

Ares watches me for another long beat, then pushes the coffee mug toward me, softer this time. “Drink,” he says. “Eat. Then you can go home.” His voice drops an octave, now rougher. “And Bambina...”

I lift my eyes to meet his.

“The next time I find you on my property without an invitation, I’ll shoot you.” His gaze sharpens, eyes narrowing, slicing clean through me. “Capisci?” The corner of my mouth twitches, half a smile, half a sob. “You can let yourself out.” And with that, he vanishes, leaving me gaping after him.

It wasn’t a dream after all. Ares Russo really did pull me from the dark and refuse to let me drown.

I don’t even remember slipping out of Ares’s house. One second I’m at the kitchen counter, barely keeping it together under his heavy stare, and the next I’m pulling open the front door, the early morning light blinding and too harsh.

The world feels wrong. Way too bright. Needlessly loud.

I wrap my arms around myself, pulling the sleeves of his hoodie farther down over my hands as I walk. The manor looms in the distance, huge and intimidating.

Somehow, it looks colder than it did before. By the time I push through the heavy front doors, my stomach’s twisted into what feels like a million knots. The house is quiet.

A few staff members glance up as I pass, their faces shuttered, carefully blank.

Nobody says anything. Nobody meets my eyes, and I can’t say I blame them.

I feel like a ghost, floating through familiar hallways that suddenly don’t feel familiar at all. Like I’m trapped inside a version of reality that doesn’t belong to me. Someone else’s life. Someone else’s pain.

I make it halfway up the main staircase when I hear voices.

Is that...Bianca and Enzo?

I shouldn’t be listening to a married couple’s quarrel, but I can’t help it, especially when the topic is me. So, quietly, I inch closer and strain my ears to listen. They’re arguing in low, frantic whispers.

I freeze, my hand tightening around the bannister.

“She’s barely holding it together,” Bianca snaps, her voice wavering under the weight of it. “She needs us, Enzo.”

“I know and we’re doing everything we can for her, mio cara,” Enzo says, his frustration bleeding through his usual calm.“We’re planning the funeral, arranging everything in London. She’ll go back?—”

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