Teddy POV
New York
The music in Amanda’s club pounded like a second heartbeat, loud, reckless, alive—but none of it reached me.
I sat in my private VIP section, half-hidden in shadows and expensive dim lighting, a bottle of gin in my hand and several empty ones scattered across the glass table. The air smelled of alcohol, perfume, and sin… but all I could feel was emptiness.
Payton had left me again—only this time, it was intentional. I woke up that morning to an empty bed. No text. No note. No explanation. She was just… gone. After everything we’d been through, after I thought we had finally bonded, she vanished without a word.
Maybe it was my fault.
I had hit her too many times. I made her cry. She probably saw me as a monster now—someone who couldn’t control his anger or his jeal
