The Scars He Left: A Second Chance At Happiness

"Fifty strikes," Floyd ordered, his voice devoid of warmth.

I knelt in the freezing snow, watching the man I had taken a bullet for five years ago stand beside his new fiancée, Jaylah.

Because Jaylah tore her engagement dress and blamed me, Floyd let his men beat me until my face was unrecognizable.

But that was just the beginning of my hell.

To save his alliance with Jaylah's family, he drained my blood to save her mother, ignoring my own fading pulse.

When Jaylah lied that I tried to burn her, Floyd forced me to thrust my hands-my architect's hands-into glowing coals until the flesh melted.

He stripped me of my name, my protection, and finally, my life.

"You are a liability," he said, pushing me into the freezing pool with a skimmer pole.

He watched me drown with the same detached interest he used to inspect firearms.

My lungs burned, and my heart turned to ice. I died hating him more than I ever loved him.

I thought it was the end.

But then, I gasped.

Air rushed into my lungs.

I wasn't in the water. I was sitting at a drafting table, five years before the nightmare began.

My hands were smooth. No scars. No burns.

And when Floyd Meyers approached me on the quad, smiling like the boy I used to love, I didn't smile back.

I ran.

Chapter 1

The first time Floyd Meyers looked at me with the eyes of an executioner instead of a guardian, I realized a terrifying truth: saving a monster's life five years ago didn't buy his love. It only purchased a front-row seat to my own destruction.

I was on my knees in the snow.

The iron gates of the Meyers estate loomed above me, black bars slicing against the slate-grey Chicago sky.

My knees were already numb, sinking into slush that had been churned into a dirty brown by the exhaust of the convoy that had just swept inside.

Floyd was the Capo.

He was the ghost who had decapitated the Russian syndicate in a single night last winter, the man whose mere whisper made grown men cross the street. He was the man who was supposed to be my husband.

Now, he stood on the other side of the gate.

He looked impeccable in his charcoal suit, the wool coat draped over his shoulders making him look like a king surveying a beggar at his doorstep.

Beside him stood Jaylah Ryan.

She was wrapped in white fur, her arm looped through his, her smile sharp enough to cut glass. At her feet lay a heap of emerald silk.

It was the engagement dress.

The dress that was supposed to symbolize the union between the Meyers and Ryan crime families. The dress she had just torn with her own manicured claws before accusing me of sabotage.

"Fifty," Floyd said.

His voice was a low rumble, devoid of the warmth that used to greet me when I brought him coffee in his study. The wind bit at my exposed cheeks, but his tone was colder.

"Floyd, please," I whispered, my teeth chattering violently. "I didn't touch it."

He didn't blink.

"You insulted the future of this Family. You insulted my fiancée. Fifty strikes for the disrespect."

He nodded to the Enforcer standing beside me.

It was Luca, a man I had known since I was a teenager, a man who had once taught me how to drive without grinding the gears.

Luca looked hesitant, his eyes darting to Floyd, pleading silently.

"Boss, she's..."

"Did I stutter?" Floyd asked.

The air around him seemed to drop ten degrees. This was the Don he had become. Ruthless. Efficient. Blind to anything but the acquisition of power.

Luca turned to me, his expression pained.

"I'm sorry, Elizebeth," he muttered.

The first slap cracked against my cheek like a whip.

My head snapped to the side. The pain was a bright explosion of white light behind my eyes. I tasted copper instantly.

I didn't cry out.

I had learned a long time ago that tears didn't move men like Floyd Meyers; they only annoyed them.

Two.

Three.

Four.

By the tenth strike, my face felt like it was on fire, a stark, agonizing contrast to the freezing snow soaking through my jeans.

Floyd watched.

He didn't flinch. He didn't look away. He watched the violence with the same detached interest he used when inspecting a shipment of illegal firearms.

Jaylah looked bored. She checked her nails.

Twenty.

My vision blurred. I swayed, catching myself with a hand in the snow. The cold burned my palm, grounding me in the misery.

I looked up at Floyd through swollen eyes.

Through the haze of pain, I remembered the bullet I took for him. I remembered the blood I spilled on the pavement five years ago, the scar that ran down my back, the nerve damage that still made my hands tremble when I was tired.

He had held my hand in the ambulance then. He had sworn on his mother's grave that I would always be safe.

Thirty.

That vow was dead.

It died the moment he needed the Ryan territory to secure his throne.

Forty.

I was just collateral damage now. A ward of the state. A leftover. An obstacle.

Fifty.

The final blow knocked me sideways.

I collapsed into the slush, gasping for air, the metallic taste of blood filling my mouth and choking me.

The gate buzzed.

The butler, a man named Henderson who used to sneak me extra cookies, walked out. He didn't look at me. He couldn't.

He threw the torn emerald dress onto my shivering body.

A small sewing kit landed in the snow next to my face.

"Fix it," Floyd said.

His voice came from above, distant and godlike.

"You stay there until every thread is perfect. If it isn't ready by dawn, don't bother coming back inside."

He turned his back on me.

He walked away with the woman who had framed me, leaving me bleeding in the snow to mend the symbol of my own replacement.

The sun was a pale, anemic thing struggling to rise over the horizon.

My fingers were blue.

They were stiff, clumsy appendages that refused to obey the desperate commands of my brain.

I sat huddled against the brick pillar of the gate, the emerald silk spread across my lap like a pool of frozen blood.

I had been sewing for six hours.

Every push of the needle had been a battle.

My hands-the hands of an architect that used to draw straight lines and complex structures-were shaking uncontrollably.

I had to bite the inside of my cheek to focus, using the sharp sting of pain to ground myself.

The last stitch.

I bit through the thread because my scissors were buried somewhere in the snow, and I couldn't feel my fingers enough to hunt for them.

I stood up.

My legs screamed in protest.

The cold had settled deep into my bones, a heavy, aching weight that made me feel brittle, as if I might shatter.

I pressed the buzzer on the intercom.

The gate clicked open.

I walked up the long driveway, the dress draped carefully over my arms to keep it from the slush.

Floyd and Jaylah were standing on the balcony above the main entrance.

They were drinking coffee.

The steam rising from their mugs looked like a distant miracle.

I stopped beneath them.

"It's done," I croaked. My voice was a broken rasp, ruined by the cold.

Floyd looked down.

He assessed the dress, his eyes scanning the seams for imperfections with a critical, unfeeling gaze.

"Bring it up," Jaylah said.

She didn't sound grateful. She sounded like she was inspecting a delivery from the dry cleaners.

I walked into the house.

The warmth of the foyer hit me like a physical blow, making my skin prickle and burn as the blood rushed violently back to the surface.

I climbed the stairs.

My face was a mask of bruises. I caught a glimpse of myself in the hallway mirror-one eye swollen shut, a split lip, dried blood crusted on my chin.

I didn't just look injured; I looked like a casualty of war.

I walked onto the balcony.

I held the dress out to Jaylah.

She took it, her manicured fingers brushing against my ice-cold knuckles. She recoiled immediately, as if I were diseased.

She held the silk up to the light.

"It's decent work," she said, sniffing disdainfully.

Then she paused.

She pointed to a tiny, dark speck near the hem.

"What is this?"

I squinted, my vision blurring.

"It's... it might be a drop of blood," I whispered. "From my lip."

Jaylah dropped the dress as if it had caught fire.

"Disgusting," she spat. "You ruined it again. I can't wear this. It has her filth on it."

She looked at Floyd, her eyes wide with feigned outrage.

"She did it on purpose, Floyd. She wants to ruin our engagement party."

Floyd looked at the emerald silk lying on the floor.

Then he looked at me.

There was no sympathy in his gaze. Only irritation.

"Get out of my sight," he said. "Go to the guest quarters. You're confined until I decide what to do with you."

I turned to leave, but my eyes caught something draped over the railing.

It was a grey scarf.

Cashmere. Hand-knit.

I had spent three months knitting that for Floyd last winter.

I had chosen that specific wool because it was soft, because he always complained that the store-bought ones were too scratchy against his neck.

Jaylah saw me staring at it.

She picked it up.

"This old thing?" she laughed. "It's so tacky. It smells like a wet dog."

She looked at Floyd. "Can I toss it?"

My heart hammered against my ribs, a painful, frantic rhythm.

"Floyd," I said, my voice trembling. "I made that for you."

Floyd didn't look at me.

He looked out at the horizon, at the city he ruled.

"It's cheap trash," he said flatly. "Throw it."

Jaylah smiled.

She tossed the scarf over the railing.

I watched it fall.

It fluttered down, twisting in the wind, until it landed in the churned-up mud of the driveway where the SUVs had parked.

It landed right in a tire track.

Something inside me snapped.

It wasn't a loud snap. It was quiet.

It was the sound of the last tether holding me to this man dissolving into nothingness.

I didn't cry.

I was too cold to cry.

I just turned around and walked toward the guest rooms, leaving the dress, the scarf, and the man I used to love behind me.

Sleep was a luxury I wasn't afforded.

I had just managed to strip off my wet clothes and crawl under the thin blanket of the servant's bed in the guest quarters when the door burst open.

It wasn't Luca this time.

It was Floyd himself.

He consumed the doorway, radiating a frantic, violent energy that sucked the oxygen right out of the small room.

"Get up," he barked.

I sat up, clutching the sheet to my chest. My face throbbed with every terrified heartbeat.

"What?"

"Jaylah's mother," he said, his voice rough. "She's been hit."

My mind raced.

The Ryans were powerful. An attack on their Matriarch wasn't just a crime; it was an act of war.

"I... I'm sorry," I stammered, my brain failing to bridge the gap. "But what does that have to do with me?"

Floyd crossed the room in two predatory strides.

He grabbed my arm.

His grip was bruising, tight enough to cut off circulation instantly.

"She lost a lot of blood. The bullet hit an artery. We can't take her to a hospital; the cops are swarming the area."

He yanked me out of bed.

I stumbled, my bare feet hitting the cold floor hard.

"She has O-negative blood," Floyd said, staring at me with dead eyes. "So do you."

I froze.

I looked at him, searching for a trace of the boy who used to bring me soup when I had the flu all those years ago.

There was nothing.

There was only a predator looking at a resource.

"You want me to donate blood?" I asked, my voice trembling.

"I'm not asking," he said.

He dragged me into the hallway.

I was wearing nothing but an oversized t-shirt and underwear, exposed and shivering.

"Floyd, please," I said, trying to dig my heels into the carpet to slow him down. "I'm exhausted. I haven't eaten in twenty-four hours. I lost blood in the snow..."

"You owe the Family," he snarled, not breaking his stride.

"I owe the Family?" I laughed, a hysterical, jagged sound that scraped my throat. "I took a bullet for you! I sewed that dress in the freezing cold! What more do I owe?"

He stopped.

He spun around and pinned me against the wall.

His face was inches from mine. I could smell the expensive cologne he wore, a scent that used to make me feel safe.

Now, it just made me want to retch.

"You owe us your life," he hissed, spittle flying from his lips. "Because without my protection, the wolves would have eaten you years ago. You are property of the Meyers estate. And right now, my alliance with the Ryans is bleeding out on a table in the basement."

He leaned in closer, his dark eyes boring into mine.

"If she dies, the merger dies. If the merger dies, I lose the city. You are going to give her every drop she needs."

He didn't wait for an answer.

He hauled me down the back stairs, past the kitchen, and into the hidden elevator that led to the underground clinic.

The "Chop Shop."

It smelled of sharp antiseptic and old rust.

Jaylah was pacing in the waiting area. Her white fur coat was splattered with red.

When she saw me, her eyes lit up. Not with gratitude. With vindication.

"About time," she snapped. "She's fading."

Floyd didn't let go of my arm.

He dragged me past her, pushing me through the double doors of the operating room.

There was a woman on the table.

Jaylah's mother. The woman who had once called me a "stray dog" at a gala.

She was pale, unconscious, hooked up to monitors that were beeping frantically.

The doctor, a nervous man named Dr. Evans who was on the Meyers payroll, looked up with sweat beading on his forehead.

"She needs it now, Boss," Evans said, his voice pitching high. "Her pressure is bottoming out."

Floyd shoved me toward the empty gurney next to her.

"Hook her up," Floyd ordered.

"Floyd," I whispered, tears pricking my eyes. "I'm scared."

He didn't look at me.

He was looking at the monitor, watching the heart rate of the woman who meant power to him.

"Just bleed, Elizebeth," he said, cold as the grave. "It's the only thing you're good for right now."