Danika's POV
The grand archway swallowed Dante's retreating figure whole, leaving only the ghost of his champagne bottle's mocking salute hanging in the air.
"You're mine."
The words lingered like a brand on my lips. Around us, the gala's carefully curated elegance curdled – crystal chandeliers suddenly too bright, Vivaldi's strings scraping like nails, the cloying sweetness of gardenias clashing with the phantom scent of Dante's leather and whiskey.
Liam's hand settled lightly on the small of my back, a grounding pressure. "Breathe, Danika." His voice was low, meant only for me, cutting through the muffled roar in my ears. "He'll cool off."
I didn't trust myself to speak. My fingers clenched around my phone, the sleek metal warm against my palm. Skyline's interview confirmation email felt like a live wire tucked against my skin. Dante knew. He'd known since the limo ride, since his icy dismissal of my ambitions. His exit wasn't about the job. It was about control slipping. About me hesitating when he'd demanded ownership.
"He's not cooling off, Liam," I managed, my voice tight. "He's drowning. And he wants to pull me under with him."
A server glided past with a silver tray. Liam snagged two flutes of sparkling water, pressing one into my hand. His fingers brushed mine – deliberate, steadying. "Smoked salmon?" he asked quietly, already scanning the circulating hors d'oeuvres.
The mundane kindness undid me a fraction. He remembered. After ten years, countless galas, and the churning chaos of his brother's life, Liam Vega remembered I hated caviar and loved smoked salmon on rye. "Please," I whispered, the word thick.
He returned moments later, the delicate canapé balanced on a napkin. "Eat. Low blood sugar won't help."
I took a small, mechanical bite, the flavors barely registering. My gaze kept straying to the archway, half-expecting Dante to burst back in, a hurricane in leather.
"He's afraid," Liam said softly, watching my face. "Terrified, actually. That job… it represents a world where he doesn't hold all the cards. Where you don't need him."
"I've never needed him like that, Liam," I protested, the truth sharp on my tongue. "I chose him. Over and over."
"And now?" His pale green eyes held no judgment, only a quiet intensity that demanded honesty. "After the 'groupie' comments? After tonight?"
The question hung, heavy as the chandeliers. Before I could formulate an answer that wasn't pure, conflicted emotion, a sharp crash shattered the relative quiet of our corner. Glass splintered on marble. A woman's startled gasp cut through the murmur of conversation.
"Fuck you, man! Get your goddamn hands off me!"
Dante's voice. Raw. Ragged. Dangerous.
We moved as one, Liam's hand firm on my elbow, guiding me swiftly through clusters of startled guests. The scene in the expansive, echoing lobby stopped my breath.
Dante stood, swaying slightly, near the fractured remains of a towering floral arrangement. Water pooled around crushed orchids and lilies. His leather vest was gone, his black shirt half-untucked, sleeves shoved haphazardly up his tattooed forearms. Two security guards in crisp black suits stood warily a few feet away, palms raised placatingly. One had a smear of dirt on his lapel.
"Mr. Vega, please," the taller guard urged, voice strained. "You need to calm down, sir."
"Calm down?" Dante spat, a wild, humorless laugh escaping him. He raked a hand through his dark hair, leaving it standing in chaotic spikes. "Why? Because the perfect Dr. Vega's party might get a little messy?" His bloodshot eyes, ringed with smudged eyeliner, scanned the gathering crowd and landed on us. A predatory focus sharpened his gaze. "Ah. The welcoming committee."
Dr. Susan Vega materialized beside us like an avenging angel in white silk. Her surgeon's composure was absolute, but the tightness around her eyes betrayed her fury. "Dante Hamilton Vega." Her voice, usually a scalpel, was now a bludgeon. "Explain yourself. Now."
Dante whirled towards her, nearly losing his balance on the wet marble. He caught himself against a pillar, leaving a damp handprint. "Perfect timing, Mamá," he slurred, the Spanish endearment laced with venom. "Come to witness the family fuck-up in glorious action?" He gestured grandly, drunkenly, at the destruction. "Don't worry. Golden Boy's here to clean it up. He always does." His bleary gaze swung back to me, locking on. "You coming, princesa? Or are you still deciding which Vega brother offers the better… prospects?"
The gasp from the onlookers was audible. Liam stiffened beside me, his jaw a hard line.
"Enough." Liam's voice cut through the tension, low and commanding, a tone I'd rarely heard from him outside an operating theater. "You're drunk, Dante. Let me call you a car. You're done here."
"Done?" Dante pushed off the pillar, lurching a step closer. The guards tensed. "I'm just getting started, Liam." He spat Liam's given name like an insult. "Always the fucking hero, aren't you? Standing there in your Savile Row armor." His eyes, dark pools of pain and fury, flickered between Liam and me. "Tell me, brother… you been waiting for this? Waiting for me to finally drive her away so you can swoop in? Play the stable, reliable alternative?"
Liam didn't flinch. "You're embarrassing yourself. And her." He nodded subtly towards me.
"Embarrassing?" Dante barked that broken laugh again. "That's rich. Coming from the guy who spent half his life hiding behind books while I actually lived." He took another unsteady step, his focus narrowing solely on Liam, radiating a dangerous intensity. "You think you deserve her? You think your little clinic, your neat little life, makes you worthy? She thrives on chaos, Liam. She breathes it. Something you'll never understand tucked away in your sterile world."
The accusation hung, poisonous and sharp. It struck a nerve, an old, buried truth. Dante saw the wildness in me Liam never fully grasped.
"Dante!" My voice cracked, sharp with warning and something perilously close to tears. I stepped forward, placing myself physically between the brothers, my palms pressing flat against Dante's chest. The heat of him, the frantic drumbeat of his heart beneath my hands, was terrifyingly familiar. "Stop this. Please."
He looked down at me, his expression fracturing. The rage bled away, leaving raw, unfiltered vulnerability. The boy who'd pulled me from the pool was suddenly visible beneath the rockstar's ruin. "You picking him?" he whispered, the sound rough, torn from his throat.
The question wasn't about Liam, not really. It was about loyalty. About the decade of chaos we'd shared. About whether the promise of something stable, something mine, was worth tearing it all apart.
I dropped my hands, the contact suddenly too much. "This isn't about picking sides, Dante. It's about me."
"Bullshit." The word was a sigh, heavy with despair. "It's always about sides." He lifted a trembling hand, not towards Liam, but towards my face, stopping inches short. His eyes traced my features – the carefully applied makeup, the hair extensions, the dress worth more than Cassia's yearly rent. "The Skyline job…" His voice was barely a rasp now. "You're really leaving. Not just the job… me."
The raw pain in his voice was a physical blow. "Dante—"
He flinched as if my voice burned him, taking a stumbling step back. "Don't." The single syllable was choked. "Just… don't."
For the first time in ten years, Dante Vega looked at me not as his princesa, his anchor, his possession, but as a stranger standing on a distant shore. The connection that had always hummed between us, even in the worst fights, snapped. A terrifying emptiness yawned in its place.
He turned, a study in shattered pride and profound loss, and walked unsteadily towards the main doors. The crowd parted silently before him, a sea of shocked faces. He didn't look back. The heavy doors swung shut behind him with a final, echoing thud.
The silence that descended was absolute, thick enough to choke on. Even the distant quartet had fallen silent.
Dr. Susan closed her eyes for a brief second, a master of composure reassembling her mask. She turned to the stunned guests, her voice miraculously steady, projecting warmth. "Everyone, please, accept our deepest apologies for the disruption. The after-party will continue in the main ballroom with some… livelier music, I think." She forced a gracious smile. "Dessert is being served."
Her gaze flickered to Liam, a silent command passing between them: Handle this.
Liam's hand returned to my elbow, his touch anchoring me in the sudden vertigo. "Come on," he murmured, steering me firmly away from the staring eyes and hushed whispers.
We slipped through a discreet door marked 'Private' into a small, plush coat room. The sudden quiet was a physical relief, the air thick with the scent of wool and cedar. Velvet benches lined the walls beneath racks of expensive outerwear. Liam closed the door softly, muffling the resurgent sounds of the gala.
I sank onto a bench, my legs finally giving way, the carefully constructed facade crumbling. The tremors started deep inside, radiating outwards until my hands shook visibly. I buried my face in my hands, the cool silk of my dress rough against my skin.
"I should go after him," I mumbled into my palms, the words thick with unshed tears and the crushing weight of responsibility. "He's in no state…"
Liam crouched before me, his dress pants stretching taut over his knees. He didn't touch me, just stayed there, a solid presence on the polished hardwood floor, his gaze level with mine. "Should you?" he asked, his voice quiet but relentless. "Or is that just the reflex? The decade of putting out Dante Vega's fires?"
I lifted my head, blinking back the hot sting in my eyes. "He could hurt himself, Liam. Or someone else."
"He's a grown man, Danika. With a security team on payroll who likely already have eyes on him." Liam's tone wasn't cold, but it was implacable. "Running after him tonight… what does it solve? It tells him this behavior works. That all he has to do is self-destruct spectacularly enough, and you'll come running."
The truth of it was a knife twist. "It's not that simple," I whispered, the old defense automatic.
"It never is with him," Liam agreed softly. He finally reached out, not to my hands, but to gently brush a stray tear from my cheek with his thumb. The touch was startlingly intimate, a breach of the careful boundary we'd always maintained. "But you deserve more than being his collateral damage. More than being called a 'groupie' in interviews. More than having your ambitions dismissed as inconvenient."
His thumb lingered for a heartbeat, a point of searing warmth against my skin, before he withdrew his hand. "Skyline… that's your dream. The one you talked about when we were tutoring, remember? Building brands, managing crises, not just… managing him."
My phone buzzed again on the velvet bench beside me. Skyline. Final interview details. The vibration seemed unnaturally loud in the quiet room. Liam's gaze flicked to it, then back to my face, holding mine with an intensity that demanded honesty.
A sharp rap on the door shattered the moment. "Dr. Vega?" The event coordinator's muffled voice was strained. "They're ready for your closing toast. Your mother is insisting."
Liam closed his eyes briefly, a flicker of frustration crossing his features. "One minute," he called back, his voice regaining its professional calm.
He stood, offering his hand to me. Not a demand, but an invitation. "Come on. Let's get you out of here. I'll have my driver take you home."
I stared at his outstretched hand. It represented escape. Sanity. The promise of a quiet room, pajamas, and distance from the crushing weight of Dante's implosion and the gala's judgmental gaze.
But another path yawned before me, dark and uncertain: finding Dante, diving back into the chaotic whirlwind, trying to salvage what was left of the night, and perhaps, what was left of us.
The phone buzzed once more against the velvet. Skyline. My future. Or the ghost of one I'd deferred for a decade.
Liam's hand remained steady, waiting. His presence was a harbor in the storm Dante had unleashed. Safe. Predictable.
But safe had never set my blood alight. Safe hadn't pulled me from dark water or kissed me under Tokyo fireworks.
The choice wasn't just about tonight. It was about who I was, and who I desperately wanted to become.
I took a deep, shuddering breath that felt like it tore through my ribs. The scent of cedar and distant gardenias filled my lungs.