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The promise of safety from the very source of my danger?

And yet, as his thumb stroked the sensitive skin of my inner wrist, I couldn't help but lean toward him, drawn like a moth to his flame.

Ahead, the storm-darkened silhouette of Rome appeared on the horizon, its enduring structures defiant against the weather's assault. Sebastian's posture subtly changed as the city came into view—shoulders tensing slightly, jaw setting into a harder line.

The Sebastian who belonged to Rome was different from the man who had made me breakfast, who had held me through the night.

My stomach tightened with inexplicable dread. Something was ending. This brief respite, this fragile truce between us.

"What happens now?"

Sebastian's gaze flicked to me briefly before returning to the road. "Now we go home."

Home.

The palazzo that was both my prison and my sanctuary.

"I meant between us," I clarified.

His grip on my hand tightened almost painfully. "That depends on you."

"On me?"

"Yes." Lightning illuminated the cruel beauty of his face. "On whether you trust what I've told you. On whether you're brave enough to believe me."

Trust.

Such a simple word for such an impossible thing.

The car sped through the storm, eating up the miles between us and Rome.

With each passing kilometer, the magic of Chieti faded as reality encroached.

Sebastian's phone vibrated in the console between us. He glanced at it, his expression hardening before he silenced it without answering.

"Problem?" I asked.

"Nothing for you to worry about." His words had taken on that edge I knew so well—the one that brooked no argument, that reminded me of the power he wielded.

We lapsed into silence after that, the only sounds the steady thrum of the engine and the relentless assault of the rain.

Rome grew larger through the windshield, its lights blurred and refracted through the water streaming down the glass.

My mind drifted to what awaited us there.

The House of Diamanti.

The campaign I was building.

Sebastian's family, with their viper smiles and poison words.

My father, lurking somewhere in the shadows.

All the complications we'd briefly escaped in Chieti.

As if sensing my thoughts, Sebastian squeezed my hand. "Stop."

"Stop what?"