Hellbound With You

CHAPTER 5: Stranger

Lorenzo Moretti POV

I don't do clubs.

Everyone knows that.

My phone buzzed. Dante.

I stared at it.

"I heard you're back in New York," he said the moment I picked up, voice already carrying that tone he used when he'd already decided something. "I'm at your doorstep. Let me in."

I looked toward the door.

Then I heard it. Two sets of footsteps.

Oh God.

Both of them.

I came downstairs to find Dante and Damon standing in my living room like they owned it. Damon was already touching things he shouldn't touch. Dante looked annoyingly comfortable.

"Why are you shirtless?" Dante said, eyes going straight to my arms as I descended the stairs. "Are you here to show us your biceps?"

"Why are you both here?" I walked past them toward the lobby. "Is this planned? Did you plan this?"

Nobody answered.

Dante fell into step beside me immediately.Old habit from the days he and Alessandro used to run through every club in Palermo together. Before marriage civilized him. Mostly.

"VIP section," he said quietly, like he was offering me something reasonable. "One drink. You don't even have to talk to anyone."

"No."

"Enzo—"

"I'm not interested."

I reached for my wine glass. Took a long sip. Then I turned toward the hallway.

"Velda."

Silence.

"Velda."

Nothing.

I walked to the kitchen. The sitting room. The hallway.

Empty.

Behind me both of them erupted.

Full laughter. The kind that meant they'd seen this coming.

"She left," Damon managed between breaths.

"About an hour ago," Dante added, completely unbothered.

I stood there.

"No one to save you Enzo," Damon said in a singsong voice, already reaching for my jacket on the hook by the door and holding it out like the matter was settled.

I looked at the jacket.

Looked at both of them.

Dante raised his glass.

Damon smiled.

I took the jacket.

"One drink," I said.

"One drink," Dante agreed.

An hour

That was all it took.

Damon was gone within sixty minutes. Zero tolerance — I had forgotten about that. One drink and a half and he was already being guided toward the exit by a very tired looking bouncer while waving goodbye to nobody in particular.

Leaving me and Dante.

The VIP section was quiet enough to think. Dante had a cigar between his fingers and a bottle of wine that was nearly empty and that particular looseness in his shoulders that meant he was well past his second drink.

"What are you thinking about?" he asked in Italian.

"Cosa stai pensando?"he asked

(“What are you thinking about?”)

I looked at him.

"What's the point. You won't remember tomorrow."

"Vero, vero." He sipped. Completely unbothered. Then that slow smile. "Should I call someone for you?"(“True”).

"No."

"Enzo—"

"I'm good Dante."

"You are clearly not good." He was already raising his hand lazily toward the crowd below.

I stood up.

That was my cue.

"Sono ancora qui. Ti aspetto. Dante's voice followed me down the steps.(“I'm still here. I’ll be waiting”.)

I ignored it.

The bar was loud and crowded.

I ordered a Negroni and pulled out my phone.

My mother.

"Chiamami. Dobbiamo parlare." (Call me. We need to talk.*)

I read it twice.

My mother didn’t send messages like that often. Whatever it was it wasn't small. I could feel the weight of it even through the screen — that specific heaviness that came with family and things left unresolved for too long.

I needed somewhere quiet to call her back.

The main floor was impossible. VIP meant Dante. Outside meant the street and a conversation I wasn't ready to have standing on a New York sidewalk.

I moved through the crowd toward the back corridor and found it — a door marked VIP RESTROOM. GENTLEMEN.

I pushed it open.

And stopped.

A woman.

Standing at the sink with her hand pressed to her chest, eyes wide.

"I'm sorry," I said. "I didn't mean to—"

"It's fine." She exhaled. Collected herself faster than most people would. "I thought you were someone else." A pause. "He's so creepy," she added quietly. Almost to herself.

I nodded.

Turned to the mirror.

And then I actually looked at her.

Not the way I looked at most people — quick assessment, filed away, forgotten. I looked at her the way you look at something that doesn't make immediate sense.

Her hair first. Black and long and slightly wild like she'd been dancing. Then her mouth — full lips, the bottom one slightly fuller than the top. Then the tattoo on her shoulder, dark ink against brown skin, something delicate I couldn't fully read from where I was standing.

I wanted to read it.

That thought arrived uninvited and I pushed it aside.

I turned back to my phone.

Slid it into my pocket.

Forgot entirely why I had come in here.

When I looked up she was already looking back.

Not performing. Not pretending she hadn't been caught. Just — looking. Steady and slightly amused like she had already decided something and was waiting to see if I'd keep up.

Then she walked toward me.

Slow. Deliberate. Each step making her intention clearer than the last.

She stopped close enough that I could smell her perfume — something warm and sweet underneath the club air.

"You looked like you needed a distraction," she said quietly.

I said nothing.

She reached up.

Grabbed the front of my jacket.

And pulled.

Her lips met mine and for one full second I didn't move. Just stood there with this stranger's mouth on mine and two years of careful numbness suddenly having nowhere to go.

Then I breathed.Actually breathed. Like something that had been sitting on my chest finally shifted.

I kissed her back.

My hands found her waist. She circled my head with small hands and threaded her fingers into my hair and I stopped thinking about my mother's message and Dante waiting upstairs and two years of everything I had been carrying.

And for the first time that night, nothing else mattered.

I pulled her up against me, and the rest stopped mattering.Her legs wrapped around me and I pressed her back against the wall gently and kissed her like I had all the time in the world. Slow. Thorough. Taking her bottom lip then her top. She tasted like strawberries and something underneath that I couldn't name but wanted to.

Her fingers moved softly against my scalp.

My hands rested at the curve of her waist.

She made a sound — low and soft and completely unplanned.

And I felt it everywhere.

Then— “SOF.” A voice, sharp and too close.

She pulled back.

Eyes meeting mine for exactly one second — dark and startled and something else I didn't have time to read.

Then she was gone.

Door swinging shut.

I stood there.

Back against the wall.

Breathing.

Just breathing.

I walked to the door and pushed it open.

The corridor was empty.

No name. No number. Nothing except the faint trace of warm sweet perfume and the specific feeling of someone who had been completely present and then completely gone.

I stood there longer than I should have.

Then I remembered.

My phone.

My mother.

"Chiamami. Dobbiamo parlare." Call me. We need to talk.*

I stared at the message.

And realized I had been standing in a corridor in a New York club for God knows how long.

Because of a stranger.

Whose name I didn't know.

Whose face I was already afraid I wouldn't forget.

I slipped the phone back into my pocket. Still thinking about her.