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Dante inclined his head, taking out his phone from his jacket pocket. “Then that’s that. Let me make some calls.”
Without another word, he walked off towards the living room, leaving her alone with the man who’d gone back to being silent, who worked around the kitchen preparing breakfast. Morana watched him crack open eggs with one hand in a bowl while he fired up the pan with the other, every action smooth, every muscle prominent, every line of his body delineated in the sunlight. She watched him work around his space and looked down at that singular bar of chocolate that meant so much more to her than he could ever comprehend.
She felt something unfamiliar lodge itself in her chest. Except for the fact that this time, the unfamiliar wasn’t an ugly monster that left her cold.
No.
This time, it was beautiful, almost tentative, and it warmed her down to her bones.
She didn’t know what it was. But watching this man with the horrific past, scarred present and unknown future work his way quietly, comfortably around the kitchen after bringing her back from the edge - twice - within minutes, knowing how important the implication of this small moment was, Morana peeled away the wrapper of the chocolate with trembling fingers, quickly hiding it inside her pocket to treasure, and took a small bite.
The sweetness melted on her tongue, going down her throat, warming her even more.
She felt like herself, only better.
Safe.
In a complete turnabout from the past minutes.
Taking another bite, she watched his back.
“Thank you,” she spoke quietly into the space between them, the words wrenched from deep inside her.
Apart from a minuscule faltering in his rhythm of beating those eggs, there was no response from him to acknowledge her words. But she knew he had heard. And if they warmed him even a degree on the inside to how much he’d warmed her, it was enough.
For now, it was more than enough.
With that thought, she went silent, focusing on the heavenly chocolate and the sinful view.
Morana had only traveled first class all her life - some trips during college, two journeys to symposiums and that one impromptu journey to Tenebrae weeks ago that had changed the course of her life. First-class was pretty normal to her.
Which was why she’d been surprised out of her mind when Dante had told them, over a scrumptious breakfast of buttered toast and eggs, that the jet had been ready and waiting for them. She’d assumed, simply because that’s how she’d always traveled, that all mobsters had traveled that way as well. Dante had cracked a little smile at that one, telling her the Outfit chartered planes whenever they needed - and they needed, a lot.
Which meant that either her father didn’t know the Outfit had private jets (which meant his spies weren’t that good), or that he was poorer than they were. Both options gave her a wicked sort of internal glee, for some twisted reason. She liked the fact that her father didn’t have all the toys in the playground. She liked it because, to her father, these were the things that mattered.
And he was lacking. That gave her joy.
So, after quickly freshening up and composing herself, knowing she couldn’t afford to lose it again once they landed in the danger zone, Morana had packed her meager collection of borrowed clothes, which had reminded her that she’d needed to buy some pronto. She’d also dropped Amara a text informing her of the newest development, promising to herself that she would keep in touch with the other woman. They both needed a friend and they couldn’t let other people dictate their lives to such an extent again.
‘Don’t let them control you.’
He’d been right. She couldn’t. Not anymore.
Tucking in her precious laptop and other equipment, that chocolate wrapper pressed safely between the pages of her planner, she was done in fifteen minutes. The first thing, as a matter of priority, she needed to do when she got settled was to shop. She was living on Amara’s borrowed clothes that didn’t fit her right and it made her realize how dire her situation was.
Going out to the living room, Morana looked at the windows and the view beyond, saying her private goodbye to them. She didn’t know when and if she would ever return to that view, and bidding adieu to the place was making her lock the cherished memories, the cherished emotions it had inspired in her. She tucked it safely inside her – the memory of that rainy night, one of the most special ones in her heart, directly related to the windows.
Slightly emotional, she turned towards the elevator, only to find Tristan Caine leaning against that wall in a suit sans the jacket, watching her quietly.
Something passed between them in that instant – the shared memory of a simple, treasured night.
And that was that.
He walked away as Dante joined them; she followed and within minutes, she was ensconced in the back of Dante’s car, heading to the airport, both men taking the front as two other cars followed behind them.
Now, sitting at the almost empty airport lounge as their plane got prepped, Morana watched through the glass doors as both men spoke privately outside the small white plane, a man in the pilot’s uniform with them, two of the security detail in the lounge with her.
“Don’t react,” a heavy voice with a slight accent came from a few feet behind her, pulling her attention.
