Roar Me Like You Mean It by Zora Black & Milly Taiden

Author:Zora Black & Milly Taiden [Black, Zora & Taiden, Milly]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2025-11-27T00:00:00+00:00

16

JENNIFER

The knock at the door is what wakes me, sharp and precise, not the fumbling kind of housekeeping or the hesitant tap of room service. My eyes open slow, heavy with sleep, but the second I register that sound my pulse kicks fast.

I sit up too quickly, the sheet sliding from my body, and for a minute I just stare around the room, confused, trying to put myself back together. The bed smells of smoke and whiskey, of something more primal underneath, and then the memory hits me. Him. Malek. His hands, his mouth, the weight of his body against mine. The heat rushes into my face before I can shove it down.

The knock comes again, followed by a voice I don’t recognize, low and professional. “Miss Callahan. Time to go.”

I swing my legs over the edge of the bed and spot the folded paper on the nightstand. My name isn’t written on it, but I know it’s for me. My hand shakes when I pick it up. The words inside are few. You are safe. Leave now.

My chest tightens so hard I can’t breathe. That’s it. No explanation, no apology, no promise. Just a dismissal. After everything that happened, after what we did, after the way his eyes burned into mine as if he saw straight through every wall I ever built. He left me with a note like I was nothing more than an inconvenience to be ushered out with the trash.

“Miss Callahan,” the voice says again, sharper this time.

I crumple the note in my fist, shove it into the pocket of my coat, and force myself to stand. My legs feel weak, my body sore, but I will not let whoever waits behind that door see it.

When I open it, two men in black stand in the hall, both expressionless, both too polished to be anything but his people. They don’t touch me, don’t threaten me, just step aside and gesture for me to follow.

The hallways are narrow, stone walls damp with age, the kind of place built to keep secrets. I keep my head high as we walk, though inside I feel like I’m unraveling thread by thread. No one speaks. No one looks at me. At the door, one of them pulls it open to the pale light of morning, and I step into the street like I’m being expelled from a world I never should have entered in the first place.

There’s a car waiting. They don’t shove me inside, don’t restrain me. One simply opens the door, and the other says, “Safe passage. That’s all.”

I climb in without a word.

The city passes in a blur—bridges, trams, markets opening for the day—but I don’t see any of it. All I see is the memory of him pacing the room, his eyes hard, his mouth grim, already pulling away before I had a chance to stop him. I hate myself for the ache it leaves, the hollow that spreads wider with every block we put between us.

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