Page 16 of Until You Break

But here it is, unmistakable, a message in the form of a bright, beautiful sunflower. Like some cruel ghost from my past, coming back to haunt me.

I shake my head, trying to steady myself, but I can’t tear my eyes away from the flower. Who would know? No one in my life—not even Mason—knows that I kept these memories close; the little fragments of Dominic I could carry with me.

They’re secrets carefully buried beneath layers of quiet routines and new habits, buried deep in the life I’ve built here, far from the girl who escaped that cell.

The thought lingers in my mind as I move around the kitchen, my hands clumsy, distracted as I start to make coffee. I turn on the machine, the familiar gurgling sound filling the silence, but my thoughts are elsewhere, spinning over and over, circling the same question with no answer in sight.

The only other possibility is that someone is toying with me, digging up a part of my past that’s better left buried. But why? Who could know about something so personal, so intimate? It feels like a cruel joke, a taunt, something meant to unsettle me—and it’s working.

If it were my captors, they wouldn’t play these games. They would drag me back to that cell without question. So, who…?

I close my eyes, resting my forehead against the rim of the mug, the heat seeping into my skin. It’s been five years, and I should be past this by now. I have a life, a fiancé, a career, even if it’s not the one I’d planned. But none of it fills the hollow space he left behind. No one could understand what I lost that night, not even Mason.

Because while I may have walked out of that forest, part of me was left behind with Dominic.

I open my eyes, looking at the sunflower again, a bittersweet smile tugging at the corner of my lips.

“Dominic,” I whisper, the name slipping out like a secret, a confession. “What would you think if you saw me now?”

Chapter ten

His Sinner

The drive into thecity feels like a blur, my mind miles away from the winding roads and tall, dark trees passing by. I can’t shake the sunflower from my thoughts, the way it sat so innocently on my counter, a splash of golden yellow in the quiet of my kitchen.

By the time I pull up to my tiny office space and step inside, my nerves are buzzing, sharp and uneasy. I slip off my jacket, glancing around the room, half expecting to see something else left for me. But there’s nothing out of place, just the familiar hum of my laptop sitting on the desk, the faint smell of dust and stale coffee lingering in the air.

The sunflower’s bright image still burns in my mind, an echo of a time I thought I’d left behind. I’ve tried looking for Dominic before—long, sleepless nights spent diving into search results, contacting anyone who might know something. Every time, I hit a dead end.

No records. No mention of him or his brothers. Just silence. Like he never existed.

With my coffee cooling on the desk and that damn sunflower rooted in my thoughts, I pull up a search window, typing in his name one more time: Dominic, Luca, Matteo. I don’t have a last name, only a vague memory of him saying they owned a garage.

But today, as I hit “Enter,” something shifts. A new result pops up, one that wasn’t there the last time I searched. My heart skips, and I lean forward, squinting at the screen, reading the words over twice to make sure I’m seeing them right.

Romano’s Custom Auto, founded by Luca and Matteo Romano, two brothers with a reputation for no-nonsense repairs and a client list kept strictly under wraps.

My breath catches. It’s them. I’m sure of it.

I click the link, pulling up a basic website with nothing more than a phone number and an address on the outskirts of the city.This city!A garage, just like Dominic said. And they’re still there, still operating, not far from where I am right now.

It’s like a spark lighting up a dark room, a surge of adrenaline mixed with something deeper, something I’ve tried to bury.Romano’s.It’s a clue, something I can finally follow. I type in the garage name, searching for more, scrolling through every link, every image that pops up.

Luca and Matteo stand outside the garage, looking every bit the rough, no-nonsense men I’d imagined. Luca has a cigarette dangling from his mouth, arms crossed as he leans against the garage wall, his face shadowed by a cap. Matteo stands beside him, long hair tied up, just as tough-looking, a grin on his face as he laughs at something off-camera.

It’s them, just like Dominic described—their rough edges, the way they carry themselves, like the world could fall apart and they’d still be standing. Seeing them like this, right in front of me, makes my heart race.

But it’s not the brothers that stop me cold. Next to them, a little off to the side, is another figure, one that pulls every ounce of air from my lungs.

Dominic.

I can’t mistake that face, that easy, almost careless smile that’s so familiar it hurts. He’s laughing, his gaze cast off to the side, like he’s in on some private joke, like nothing in the world could weigh him down.

Dressed in black with his tattoos visible, he’s younger here, but not by much, maybe only a few months before… before everything happened. He’s leaning against the wall beside his brothers, his familiar, crooked smile aimed at whoever’s behind the camera. His hair’s a little longer and mussed-up, his eyes bright and alive in a way I can hardly believe.

I reach out, fingertips brushing the screen as if I can somehow bridge the gap, as if I could touch him through the pixels, bring him back. Seeing him again, like this, is almost too much.

The smile that once comforted me, his face, so vivid and real, I can almost hear his voice, that soft sarcasm, the way he’d tease me to keep my spirits up. My eyes blur, a painful tightness gripping my throat as I stare at him, my hand flying to my mouth as I choke back a sob.

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