warnings: this chapter contains references to injury and grief. and perhaps also medical inaccuracies, because i'm the writer and i can do whatever i want. reader discretion is advised.
word count: 3.6k
forty six | forty seven | forty eight
The first thing that Y/N registered was sound.
Not voices, not footsteps, but a mechanical rhythm: a high, shrill beep that seemed to come from somewhere above her, steady and endless. She floated on it for a while, carried like driftwood, unsure if she was meant to be awake at all. Whatever it was beeped steadily, and every beep was followed by the heavy thump of her own heart, uncomfortably loud inside her ribs.Â
When her eyes finally cracked open, the world was too bright. Blinding white light pressed into her skull, blurred shapes swimming across her vision. She blinked, blinked again, but her vision barely sharpened. She tried squinting and then the world swam before her eyes, all bleached outlines and blurred movement.Â
Breathing hurt.
Her throat burned, dry, raw â every breath scraped like she was swallowing broken glass. Panic clawed up her chest before she could think, and her hand moved clumsily, trying to tug some thin plastic tubing off her face. The foreign object sat beneath her noseâforeign, suffocating. As soon as she could feel it, she wanted it gone.
Then she coughed before she could stop herself, and the world immediately rioted in alarm. Instantly, the monitor spiked, her chest seized, and pain flooded her ribs.Â
âOi. Easy, easy,â someone greeted softly. The voice was low, rough, careful like she was made of glass.Â
Her head tilted toward the sound sluggishly, weighted down by drugs. She blinked yet againâonce, twiceâand finally there he was, slouched forward in the visitorâs chair, elbows on his knees. His hair was messy, his jaw unshaven, the skin beneath his eyes tinged purple with exhaustion. Even his shoulders slumped like theyâd been holding up the ceiling.
But sheâd recognize those eyes anywhere.
Liam.
For a moment, her body softened, surrendering to recognition. Her fingers slipped from the cannula sheâs been trying to get rid of, the frantic terror in her chest quieting at the sight of him. Even just having him thereâreal, solid, familiarâsoothed something inside her, the part of her that had been terrified and floating in darkness for what had felt like forever. Her eyes still stung from the intensity of seeing again, but she let out a shaky breath of relief.
The corner of his own mouth pulled into a smile then, though weaker, like he wasnât used to the shape of it anymore. His throat worked, like he had to force the words out. ââCourse I am. Wouldnât be anywhere else.â
When he looked up at her, Y/N was wearing a lopsided smile, soft and sincere.
The silence stretched. In the background, the EKG had resumed beeping evenly while someone laughed faintly out in the hall. Y/N took the opportunity to let herself look at him â really look. His clothes appeared wrinkled, almost like heâd slept in them. Her gaze drifted down to his wrist where she found a familiar threadbare bracelet of charcoal grey and deep green tied around his wrist, gently frayed from wear.Â
For a moment, she let her eyes close, just listening as she took it all in: the beeping machines, the low hum of air conditioning, the faint squeak of shoes on the hall tiles beyond the door. But mostly, his breathing. It was steady, human. Alive.Â
Perhaps most importantly, it was proof she wasnât alone.
When she opened her eyes again, he was still staring. Relief radiated from him in waves so fierce it almost frightened her. His hands were clasped together tightly, his knuckles pale â like if he didnât hold them steady theyâd reach for her against his better judgment.
Her lips cracked into the faintest smile. âYou look like hell.â
He huffed a laugh, though it came out thin. âThanks. This was supposed tâbe my good side, actually.âÂ
His gaze flicked briefly toward the machines, then back to her, as though afraid she might disappear if he looked away too long.
âWhat⌠happened?â she rasped, brows furrowing in confusion. She remembered pain and then cold, yet very little else, the rest of the memory temporarily hidden in flashes of thought that seemed to slip between her fingers even more the harder she tried to catch them.
âYou donât need to worry about that yet.â His tone was soft, steadying. âYouâre safe now. Thatâs what matters.â
Safe.
Her body hurt everywhereâchest tight, ribs screaming when she breathed too deep, muscles sore as though sheâd been run through. She shifted weakly against the sheets, grimacing. He noticed, leaning forward an inch before stopping himself, hands clenching tighter.
âYouâve been through a lot,â he murmured. âDonât push yourself.â
She believed him, for a moment. She wanted to. Morphine blurred the edges of her thoughts, softened the sharp fear that had jolted her awake.Â
He was here.Â
She wasnât alone.
But beneath the drugged haze, something tugged. Her eyes lingered on himâon the curve of his mouth, the lines at his eyes. Familiar, yes. But there was something else too, something wrong.Â
âLando.â
It slipped out of her before she could stop it. His head jerked, eyes wideâcaught.
Her breathing hitched. Her heart monitor spiked. And then it hit her like a rush of cold water, like glass shattering in her chest.Â
The gunshots in the alley. The reporter on the radio.The articles on the internet. The lies in her apartment. His name spoken on a phone call sheâd never forget.
She remembered all of it.
Her pulse thundered, the machine beside her screaming along with it. âNo. No, no, noââ Her voice cracked into panic. She shoved feebly at the blanket, wires tugging at her skin. âGet out. Get out!â
âWaitââ He half-rose, one hand lifting toward her instinctively, but the terror in her face stopped him cold.
âDonât touch me!â she cried, raw-throated, tears spilling hot and fast. âYou liedâyouâyouâre a monster! Get away from me!â
Her words devolved into tears, monitors shrieking in protest.
âPlease,â he whispered, shattered, like the word itself could change anything.
But she was already screaming again, panic slicing through even the haze of morphine. âGet out! Get out! Get out!â
He lingered a beat too long, agony carved across his face. Then, finally, he obeyed and gave her what she was begging for. With his shoulders hunched, eyes hollow, he took one last lookâlike he was carving her into memoryâbefore he slipped out the door just as footsteps began to close in down the hallway.
The door clicked shut behind him.
And for the first time since she woke, Y/N was completely and utterly alone.
The machines shrieked in alarm, and almost immediately there were hands everywhereâgloved, steady, practiced..
Two nurses had rushed in, their shoes squeaking against the tile. One went straight to the monitors, silencing the shrill beeping; the other leaned over her, gentle hands pressing her shoulder down into the bed.
âEasy, madame,â one of the nurses murmured as she adjusted the monitors. The other gently pried Y/Nâs hands from the wires she had been tugging at. âYou are safe. You are okay. Just take a breath, yes?â
When she tried to, her chest heaved, pain sparking like firecrackers along her ribs. She cried through it anyway, throat aching. Her throat scratched with every sound, but she couldnât stop. The room spun and her body hurt everywhere, as if she had been stitched together wrong.
âVitals are elevated,â a voice called out. The sound of the heart monitor was still erratic, blaring her panic into the room.
A doctor appeared in the doorway, drawn by the commotion, and moved briskly to the foot of the bed. His tone was calm, rehearsed. âLikely you are overwhelmed, though it could also be some trauma from your incident. Waking up can be confusing, but letâs get you settled.â
They dimmed the lights and spoke in low voices. A hand squeezed her wrist, reminding her to stay grounded, to stay here. None of them questioned why she had screamed, or who she had been screaming at. All the while, hot tears slid down her temples and into her hair. Y/N curled weakly onto her side, away from them all, away from the door he had just left through.
âDeep breaths,â a nurse coaxed softly, pressing a cool hand to her shoulder. âYouâre okay now. Youâre okay.â
The words became background noise as her gaze flitted back toward the door.Â
He was gone â not gone far, but just gone enough.
Outside the room, the hallway was unnervingly quiet. Lando stood rooted to the linoleum, just out of sight from her bed but angled toward the window that looked in. His shoulders were rigid, his hands shoved deep into his pockets, and he didnât blink as he watched the flurry of hospital personnel crowd her. His eyes were fixed on her, dark and unreadable.
Max Fewtrell approached slowly, footsteps muted with a paper cup of coffee in hand. He followed Landoâs gaze through the glassâsaw the girl curled tight, nurses smoothing wires, one brushing hair from her damp forehead.
âDid you talk to her?â he asked, perhaps a bit more hopefully than he should have been only for his friendâs sake
Lando didnât move. His reflection in the glass looked ghostlike, pale under the fluorescent hall lights. For a long time, he said nothing. Then, Lando spoke without turning.
In the quietest of voices, he confessed. âI think she hates me.â
There was no anger in it, no pleading, not even heartbreak â just a dim, extinguished certainty. It was the quiet extinguishing of the smallest flame, leaving nothing but dim ash behind. His voice carried no fight, no violence.Â
Only resignation.
Max glanced at him, throat tightening. For once, Lando didnât look terrifyingâhe didnât look like anything at all. He just seemed like a man who had gone quieter in some final, irreversible way.
Two days later, the beeping of her monitors had become little more than background noise. The doctors had kept her under constant watch, poking and prodding, cycling through reading her charts every few hours. For the first time since sheâd opened her eyes, her vitals had held steady. The monitors no longer screamed with every startled breath; the nurses checked her charts with nods instead of frowns.
Stable, they said. Out of crisis.
That morning, a doctor in a pale coat came to her bedside, yet another chart in hand. He looked tired, as though heâd been working three shifts straight. Still he glanced over her file and then at her, offering a practiced smile.
âIt is good news â your recovery is well on track. Youâre breathing without too much supplemental oxygen, your blood pressure is holding steady and there have been no more complications, fortunately. Youâre not fully healed, of course, but I pleased to inform you that you are well enough to continue recuperating at home.â
Home?
She barely had the strength to sit up without gasping.
The doctor was already continuing. âYou will need home care, of course. Two to three weeks minimum. Someone to monitor your medicines, keep track of wound care, help with meals. Do you live with anyone who can take care of these things?â
She blinked at him. Her mind flickedâtoo fast, too sharpâthrough all the people who were not there. Margot, who would have been the obvious answer, who was dead. Kika, who lived with her dog in her boyfriendâs apartment.Â
So, she had no one, it seemed.
Her lips parted, ready to form some vague lie about a roommate, when the doctor shuffled through the stack of papers at the end of her bed. âAh, my apologies. It is here.â He tapped a page, pleased. âNo worries, we already have the contact information we were given on the night you were admitted.â
Her stomach sank. âNo, wait, she canâtââ
Margot wonât pick up, she wanted to say. But the nurse beside him was already dialing.
âReally,â she tried again, her voice catching, âyou donât need toââ
The nurse smiled kindly, mistaking her panic for pride. âDonât worry. Itâs only for a couple of weeks. Everyone needs a little help after something like this. Nothing to be ashamed of.â
Her protests evaporated uselessly into the sterile air.
It didnât take long. The sound of his steps reached her before he appeared â measured, deliberate. With her luck, it was Lando who entered the room in silence, face scrubbed clean of expression, clothes neat as always. He listened as the doctor outlined the home care instructionsâmedications, mobility restrictions, redressing, warning signs that would mean a trip back to the ER.
Lando nodded along, polite, neutral. Not once did he look at her. His profile was sharp, impassive, his voice even. âUnderstood. Iâll make sure sheâs taken care of.â
She opened her mouth, heart thudding. âWhat? No, I donâtâ I cannot possiblyââ
Before she could finish her sentence, or scream that this was the last thing she wanted, the nurse whoâd been helping her all week beamed at the pair of them. âItâs wonderful, really. Youâre quite lucky,â she said to Y/N, adjusting her chart. âNot everyone has someone so devoted. Heâs hardly left your bedside these last few nights.â
Her cheeks burned. âHeâs notââ
But the team was already moving on, their footsteps retreating down the hall, their chatter fading.
The door clicked shut.
Leaving her with him.
Fuck.
She thought, for a split second after the doctors left, that maybe he would linger. Maybe heâd try to explain, or plead, or say something at all. But he didnât. He seemed to take her pleas as instruction, following them to the letter. He kept his distance. There were no more long vigils by the bed, no more words at all.Â
Only a shadow, always on the other side of the glass.
The next time Y/N actually saw him was the morning of her discharge. The nurses chatted softly, guiding her through the discharge processâ through IVs removed, papers signed, instructions repeated until they blurred together. Through it all, he lingered at the edges, answering questions when staff looked his way, but never once meeting her eyes.
Finally, once theyâd handed over the bag of her belongings and a packet containing her medications, they were allowed to leave. He wheeled her out without a word, down the sterile corridor, into the elevator, across the bright car park. And then she was outside, blinking at sunlight for the first time in weeks.
A familiar car waited at the curb â all sleek black metal, its windows tinted. The air inside was thick, suffocating. The silence pressed heavy and stale, tinged with something bitter she couldnât quite name.
Once Lando began to drive, Y/N stared out the window as the city crawled past. For a split instant, she remembered another time in these same seats â late-night drives, music humming through the speakers, the windows down, her laughing until her throat hurt. The way sheâd often dozed off against the glass, safe in the knowledge heâd get her home. The warmth of his hand tapping the steering wheel in time with the beat. The way sheâd woken to find a familiar hoodie draped over her.
Now it was unbearable.
She stared harder at the passing scenery, insistently trying not to think, trying not to remember. Beside her, Landoâs face was carefully plain, every feature smoothed into neutrality. He might as well have been carved from stone.
He would take her back to her apartment, of course. After all, how could he possibly think this could continue, after everything that had happened?
But it was okay. Y/N was beginning to learn that sheâd rather be hurt alone, then to give him a chance to break her again.Â
It wasnât until the streets began to twist into unfamiliar shapes that she snapped upright. And as the minutes ticked by, the streets grew less and less familiar.
Her pulse spiked. âWhat? This isnât the way.â
No response came. His hands stayed steady on the wheel.
âTake me home.â
Still nothing.
âI want to go home!â Her voice cracked, pleading.
Finally, he answeredâlow, careful, each word clipped like it had been rehearsed. âI canât leave you on your own like this. You know that.â
The words were posed carefully, politely â almost convincing. But underneath, there was something desperate under the politeness.
âYes you can. You will! Youâ You have to. Take me back, or I swearââ
âIâm only trying to help youââ
âWell I donât want your help!â she yelled, her throat burning from the effort. She turned on him, anger spilling over. âDonât you get it? I donât want you.â
He tried not to flinch, but she saw it anywayâthe smallest ripple breaking through the mask. The words seemed to lodge inside him, deep and immovable, like a knife between his ribs. Still, he kept his eyes on the road, jaw clenched so tight she thought it might crack.
âY/N, please,â he murmured, quieter now. âJusâ try to understand. Iââ
âNo. I hate you.â
He didnât look at her. He fixed his gaze hard on the road ahead, knuckles white on the wheel. And after too long a beatâlong enough for the betrayal in her eyes to sear itself into him once again â he exhaled, resigned.
âIâm sorry,â he whispered.
And he meant it in every way possibleâsorry for the lies, for the blood, for the broken pieces of whatever was now scattered between them. Sorry that his love looked like this. Sorry that the only way he could protect her was by forcing her into the very place she didnât want to beâby his side.
But the words dissolved into the hum of the tires, too fragile to hold onto, too late to change anything.Â
So Lando kept driving.
The ride stretched on in silence, suffocating. She tried to ignore the way her heart hammered in her chest, but her eyes kept darting to the unfamiliar streets, to the winding roads that grew emptier and emptier until there was almost nothing left but open fields and empty sky.
That was when the gates appeared.
The car slowed, tires crunching over gravel. Ahead of them, two massive wrought-iron gates towered well over the height of the car. Each of them was black and ornate, the metal curving into sharp, intricate patterns. They opened on silent hinges without hesitation, as if obeying some invisible command, as if the house itself knew who had arrived.
It became difficult not to stare.
Beyond the gates stretched sprawling lawns that seemed to go on forever, trimmed within an inch of perfection and bordered by perfectly manicured rows of evergreens so tall they could have been walls. It was vastâendlessâand yet suffocating in its order, not a single leaf out of place. The world inside felt cut off from everything elseâself-contained, a fortress disguised as paradise.
And at the center of it all: the house.
Calling it a mansion felt reductive, considering it was no less than any palace. It wasnât gaudy or gilded â it didnât need to be. The place had Victorian elegance woven into its very bones â pale brown stone so light it was almost ashen given shape by sharp lines, windows set deep like watchful eyes. Modern touches softened it here and there, but seemingly not enough to make it warm. The whole thing carried a gothic tone, like it had been designed to loom. The cloudy sky above only added to the impression, the entire scene washed in silver and ash.
It was breathtaking. And terrifying.
The car slowed at the main entrance. She told herself not to gawk, not to give him the satisfaction of knowing how small it made her feel. She most certainly didnât want him to think she was impressed.
The car came to a stop just before the front steps.
Her door opened, and she blinked up at a man she didnât recognize. He was younger than she expected, with quick brown eyes and an easy smile that felt oddly warm amid the grayness of the afternoon.
âLogan,â he introduced himself simply. His recognizable accent tugged faintly at certain syllables, quick and light. âYou must be Y/N.â
Relief hit her harder than she expected. Even though he was virtually a stranger, she was just happy he wasnât Lando.Â
He wasnât the one she hated.
When he offered a steady hand, she took it without hesitation, letting herself lean into his support as she rose shakily from the seat. The pull of stitches in her side made her wince, but Logan adjusted without comment, slipping into the role of helper as if it came naturally. Logan supported the weight of her without complaint.
It helped her feel a little bit less like a burden.
When she almost lost her footing because of the stupid gravel, the American was quick to catch her, grinning as he joked. âWatch your step. Think weâve had enough hospital time to last a while, yeah?â
It was a dumb joke, barely even funny, really â but it was enough to pull a reaction out of her, the first sound even resembling her genuine laugh since sheâd woken up in the hospital. He also had a boyish charm about him â a kind of younger-brother energy that made him instantly disarming. For the first time in days, she didnât feel cornered.
In fact, for someone who seemed to come from a place like this, she found no reason to feel threatened by him. If anything, he had one of those faces that just seemed familiar, like she easily could have seen him on a magazine cover or at the market or across the stress from her cafe.Â
Behind them, the car engine idled. Lando hadnât moved, hadnât said a single word since the fight. He only watched from behind the wheel, his expression unreadable.
Once Logan had guided her safely to the towering front doors, Lando finally shifted. He gave Logan a single nod before pulling away. He left without any goodbye, and without any explanation. Without saying a word, he was gone.Â
His signature McLaren disappeared down the long entryway, swallowed by the trees, until it was almost like Lando had never been there at all.
When Logan and Y/N finally managed to inch their way up to the massive double doors, Logan pushed one open and stepped aside, a hand braced against the heavy wood like a gentleman.
She thanked him, stepping in carefully, before freezing in place just inside the threshold.
The house stole her breath.
Polished wooden floors gleamed beneath vaulted ceilings. A grand staircase climbed upward in sweeping curves. Hallways stretched out in every direction, disappearing into shadow, lined with doors she couldnât even begin to count. Everything was endless, expensive, ethereal.
For a moment, she felt as though sheâd stepped into another world.
With a mock bow and a lopsided grin, Logan tilted his head toward her.
âWelcome to the Norris Estate.â
a/n: hello... hope you guys aren't too mad about this one...
truthfully i don't think this is one of my favorite chapters, but i spent hours trying to turn it into something usable out of the garbage it was before, so hopefully something is better than nothing! and as always, feedback is appreciated :)
