My stomach tightens.
"Who?"
Please not Wes. I don't trust myself to stay calm a second time.
Julian shrugs. "Didn't say. Just asked if you were here. Seemed nervous though.”
A client? Someone from the film company?
“I’ll take care of it,” I tell Julian. “You go get some sleep. You look like death.”
"Feel like it too," he mutters, heading toward the back rooms.
I step outside, blinking against the morning sun only to be met with a figure standing near the entrance.
For a brief moment, my body tenses—similar height, similar build to Wes—and the rage flares back.
But it's not him.
This man is older. Taller by a few inches.
Broad shoulders that speak of physical work, not gym memberships. Dark hair streaked with gray, pulled back at the nape. Jeans and a worn leather jacket. His eyes—deep brown, almost black—study the building like it means something to him.
"Can I help you?"
My voice comes out guarded, edged with leftover adrenaline.
He turns, and something in his expression shifts.
Recognition. Relief. Fear.
"I..." He stops, lets out a breath. "I had this whole speech ready. But now that I'm here..."
He trails off, runs a hand through his hair—a gesture that's eerily familiar because I do the same thing.
I cross my arms and wait. He squares his shoulders like he's preparing for impact.
"There's no easy way to say this. My name is Dominic. Dominic Torres."
He swallows hard and my heart rate goes through the roof because I recognise the name.
“I’m…uhh?—"
It feels like the wind just got knocked out of me.
“I know who you are.” I stare at him, looking for denial, proof, anything. But the longer I look, the more I see it.
The same dark eyes. The same jaw. The way he stands with his weight forward, always ready to move.
"I've tried calling," he adds. "Multiple times. Then I saw the Rolling Stone interview—they mentioned the studio. So, I had to try and thought this might be a conversation that’s better to be had in person than over the phone.”
The unknown numbers lighting up my phone for weeks and the voicemails I never listened to. They were his.
"Why show up now?"
He looks at the ground. "Because I don't want to miss the chance again."
"You had twenty-eight years of chances."
