The afternoon light slanted across the busy Manhattan street, catching on passing cars and glittering storefront windows. The hum of traffic and chatter swirled around them, but in that single, suspended moment, it all seemed to fade.
Rose froze. Her heart thudded painfully in her chest as her gaze locked with his.
Nikolai.
He stood just a few steps away on the sidewalk, tall and composed in his dark suit, yet his eyes—those cold blue eyes that once looked at her like she was the only thing that mattered—were wide, almost disbelieving. The crowd moved around them, splitting like a current around two unmoving rocks. For a second, neither of them spoke. Neither of them even breathed.
"Rose." His voice was rough, cracked at the edges, her name sounding like both a prayer and an apology.
Rose's lips pressed together, trembling despite her best effort to appear calm. "Nikolai," she whispered back.
And then he moved—two long strides that erased the distance between them. His arms wrapped around her before she could think, pulling her against his chest with a force that almost knocked the air out of her. The scent of him—whisky, smoke, and something uniquely Nikolai—flooded her senses.
For a moment she didn't move, her body rigid from shock, but then her arms lifted and found their way around him. Her fingers clutched his jacket, her face buried in his shoulder. His grip only tightened, like he feared she might dissolve into the air if he let go.
"I missed you," he murmured against her hair, his voice barely above a whisper. It was raw, vulnerable in a way she had never heard before.
When he pulled back, his hands lingered on her arms. She looked up at him, her eyes shining with a mix of anger, longing, and heartbreak.
"But you didn't call," she said quietly. "You didn't text. You didn't even try to find me."
He looked down, his jaw tightening. "I was waiting for you to calm down. I thought you'd call me. Or come back."
Rose gave a shaky laugh that wasn't really a laugh at all. "Well, I was waiting for you to call or text me. Or come looking for me."
Silence stretched between them, heavy with all the words left unsaid. The city pulsed around them, but for them, time stood still.
And in that fragile, aching stillness, they both realized how terrible they'd been to each other. How stubbornness had filled the spaces where love should have spoken.
"Let's go," Nikolai said finally, his tone low but certain.
Rose didn't protest. She only nodded, and together they walked toward the black car parked at the curb. He opened the passenger door for her without a word. She slid inside, her heart hammering, and watched through the glass as he circled to the driver's side.
The moment he settled behind the wheel, silence fell again. The car hummed to life, and the city slowly slipped by outside the windows.
Neither of them spoke the entire ride. She stared out at the skyline glowing in the golden light, her reflection faint against the glass. He kept his eyes on the road, the faint muscle in his jaw ticking now and then.
When they finally pulled into the underground parking of his building, Rose's chest felt tight. They rode the elevator in silence, standing side by side, close enough that she could feel his warmth, yet far enough that the space between them felt like miles.
The elevator doors slid open with a soft chime, and they stepped into the penthouse. It looked the same—sleek, minimalist, and immaculate—but somehow emptier than she remembered.
They both stopped in the living room. Neither moved for a moment. Then, as if on instinct, they both sat—she on the couch, him across from her in the armchair. The quiet between them was almost unbearable.
Finally, Rose broke it.
"Do you still plan on not telling me anything about your past?" she asked softly. Her voice trembled slightly, but her gaze held steady on him.
Nikolai exhaled, leaning back. His eyes darkened, the shadows under them deep. "It's just too ugly, Rose," he said. "It's not something I want you to know."
She frowned, shaking her head. "But that's what love is supposed to be about, isn't it? Not just the beautiful parts. The ugly parts too. You can't expect me to love only half of you."
His jaw clenched. He looked down at his hands, then up at her again. Her eyes were soft but firm, unyielding in their sincerity.
"You deserve better than the ugliness," he said quietly.
"I deserve the truth," she countered. "All of it."
The silence stretched, thick and fragile. Then he sighed, leaning forward, his elbows on his knees, his hands clasped. His eyes dropped to the floor before finding hers again.
"Fine," he said. His voice was low, almost a whisper. "You want to know? I'll tell you."
Rose's heart stuttered. She nodded once, bracing herself.
He began slowly.
"I grew up in a brothel," he said flatly, but his tone cracked halfway through. "My mother was a prostitute. I never knew my father. She… she sold herself to survive, and when that wasn't enough…" He swallowed hard, his throat working. "Sometimes she sold me too."
Rose's breath hitched, but she didn't interrupt.
"I was twelve when I snapped," he continued, his eyes fixed somewhere far beyond the room. "She wanted to sell me again. I was still covered in bruises from the last client." His hands trembled slightly. "I picked up a wooden box and hit her. Once. Twice. I didn't stop until she stopped moving. Until there was nothing left."
The room went silent except for the faint hum of the city below.
He ran a hand through his hair, eyes hollow. "They arrested me. Threw me into juvenile prison in Moscow until I was fifteen. Those years… they were worse than hell. Beatings, starvation, the kind of things that make you forget you're human."
Rose's eyes glistened, her chest tightening with every word.
"When I got out, I had nothing," he said. "No home, no family. I lived on the streets. Sometimes I'd sell myself again—for a piece of bread, a warm place to sleep. But eventually, no one wanted a dirty kid anymore. I'd fight dogs for food. Sometimes I won, sometimes I didn't."
He gave a broken laugh, shaking his head. "I begged outside churches. The priests pretended I wasn't there. Even the people of God couldn't look at me. So I stopped asking. I stole. I got caught. I was beaten, humiliated. Sometimes I'd go days without eating. The only thing that kept me alive was hate. Hate for the world. Hate for myself."
Rose pressed her trembling fingers to her mouth, tears spilling silently down her cheeks.
"There was a time," he continued, voice raw now, "when I started selling drugs. Small-time. Just enough to survive. I thought I was doing fine until Sergei found me. I was nineteen. He saw a weapon. And he made me one."
He paused, staring down at his hands. "He trained me. Used me. Turned me into what I am now. Ruthless. Efficient. Soulless. He buried everything—my name, my past, all of it. To the world, I was reborn as someone else. Someone dangerous. Someone who didn't need love or kindness. And I believed it."
He looked up at her then, his eyes glossy, his expression stripped bare. "I never knew love, Rose. My mother used me. The world broke me. Sergei forged what was left into a weapon. I never thought someone like you could exist. Someone who could look at me and not flinch."
By the time he finished, Rose's face was wet with tears. She couldn't breathe through the ache in her chest.
Slowly, she moved from the couch and knelt before him. Her hands reached for his, fingers trembling as she wrapped them around his.
"Nikolai," she whispered, voice cracking. "I'm so sorry. For walking away. For being angry. I didn't know… I didn't know what you were carrying."
He shook his head weakly, but she pressed on. "No. Listen to me. I don't care about the past. I care about you. The man sitting in front of me. You think what you went through makes you unlovable, but it doesn't. It just makes you human. You survived when most people wouldn't have. And I love you for that. For all of it."
Her tears fell onto his hands, warm and real. "We just need to work on us. On how we talk. Because our communication is terrible," she said, letting out a choked, shaky laugh through her tears.
He managed a faint smile, the first in days, and nodded. "Yeah," he whispered. "Terrible."
Then, slowly, he reached into his pocket. Her breath caught when he pulled out the ring—the same one she had thrown at him that night. He turned it between his fingers, then looked at her, his gaze softening.
He took her hand and slid the ring back onto her finger.
"I'm sorry," he said quietly. "For everything. And from now on, I'll try to be more open. You're right. As my future wife, you deserve to know all of me. The darkness, the scars, everything. Because you're the only one who ever looked at me and saw more than the monster everyone else saw."
Her lips quivered as she nodded. "And you know everything about me already," she whispered. "It's only fair I know you too."
He smiled faintly, brushing his thumb across her cheek, wiping away a tear.
Then she hesitated, her brows furrowing softly. "You went through all that alone," she murmured. "Where was your father?"
He let out a bitter exhale. "My mother was a prostitute, Rose. Any one of those men could've been my father. All I know is that one of them was married. I was a mistake someone paid to forget."
Her heart cracked a little more. She leaned in, wrapping her arms around him, pressing her face into his chest. "You're not a mistake," she whispered fiercely. "You're here. You survived. And we have each other now. That's what matters."
He held her tight, his hand finding the back of her head. For the first time in what felt like forever, the weight in his chest lifted—just enough to let him breathe again.
"Yeah," he murmured against her hair. "We have each other."
And for the first time in days, the world outside didn't matter.