Page 75 of Fallen Empire
And then Savannah spoke hers. Quietly. Gently. Like she wasn’t dropping a bomb in the middle of the room.
I already knew her past was dark. I’d seen her scars, felt the silence in the spaces she never filled with words. But hearing it, really hearing what she’d survived, made me feel like a con.
The love of my life died. I haven’t told her that yet. Abouthim. The only man I ever loved. The one I lost. The one I never talk about—because speaking his name feels like opening a wound I’ve spent years pretending didn’t exist.
The love of my life simply died. Hers? He stayed. Stayed and broke her piece by piece. And then came back to haunt her like the final act of a horror show she never auditioned for.
While I’d been hiding behind wine and work and pretty clothes, pretending I had it all together while being terrified to love again.
Savannah had herbodybroken.
And Me? I was just scared of having myheartbroken.
And the truth I hadn’t wanted to face?
Both are valid.
Both are different brands of hell.
Some people carry trauma on their skin. Others carry it in the echo of words that were never said. In the weight of abandonment. In the pressure to be perfect. In the fear that they are too much—or not enough—all at once.
And emotional wounds? They bleed just the same.
I used to think rock bottom was something you climbed out of. That there was a ladder. Or a rope. Or at least a way back up.
But watching Savannah, I realized something else. Sometimes, rock bottom has a basement. Without stairs.
That’s not just survival.
That’s a revolution.
And maybe, just maybe, I wasn’t far from rising myself.
I thought about Ben. About how it felt when his lips met mine all those years ago—how just yesterday, his touch sent a wildfire through every nerve in my body.
I was capable of love.
I was just avoiding it.
But maybe... maybe I could feel something again. Something real. Something that didn’t end with me pretending not to care when a man walked out of my bed and out of my life.
The truth? I’d always been independent enough to not need anyone. But the reality?
IwantedBen.
Maybe it didn’t have to be love.
Maybe we could just use each other.
Let our desire drown out the pain. Let the fire between us burn loud enough to quiet whatever haunted us.
Because I had my demons. And I had no doubt that Ben’s past was riddled with monsters who still walked the earth.
For the first time in days, I felt like everything might actually be okay.
Savannah was healing, slowly, but surely. She’d be going home soon. Free, for real this time. Free from the shadows. From the fear. From the constant tension that used to live in her shoulders like a second skin.
And maybe it was time I found a little freedom, too.
