He let her close. He still didn’t let her have him.

María Rivera is back in Adrian Kessler’s loft and back under the ruthless discipline of his training. He feeds her. Pushes her. Takes care of everything she needs.

He just doesn’t trust her.
Not with his heart.
Not with his softness.
And definitely not with the version of him she used to have.

So...

He came back. That doesn’t mean she gets him back.

María Rivera thought Adrian Kessler’s return would change everything.

It does. Just not the way she wants.

He’s back in the gym. Back in her orbit. Back close enough to touch the bruised edges of everything she’s been trying to outrun. But Adrian isn’t the man she left. He’s harder now. Sharper....

He disappeared from her life. She didn’t know absence could hit this hard.

María Rivera made a choice out of fear. She did not expect to end up living inside it.

Now Adrian Kessler is gone from the shape of her life—gone from the gym, gone from her orbit, gone from all the places she’d started relying on without meaning to. And the worst part isn’...