—Where love becomes the most dangerous kind of loyalty.
---
The apartment felt too still after Luca left.
Like something sacred had been broken.
Serena sat on the edge of the bed in Damon's room, the city lights flickering across her skin in golden ribbons, her robe loosely tied around her waist, damp hair sticking to the curve of her neck. Her fingers trembled—not from fear, but from the weight of what she now carried.
Everything had changed.
And still, Damon stood by the window, silent, shirt half-buttoned, like a soldier waiting for the next gunshot.
"I never wanted this for you," he said finally, voice low. Ragged. "This isn't how I wanted us to start."
Serena looked up slowly. Her voice cracked through the silence.
"Do you regret it?"
He turned then. Eyes like bruised steel.
"No."
A beat.
"But I hate that loving me has put a target on your back."
She stood. Slowly.
And when she reached him, she didn't touch him right away. She looked at him like she was memorizing the way he held pain—quietly, fiercely, like he was trying to protect her from drowning in it.
"Stop thinking I'm something breakable," she whispered. "You didn't do this to me, Damon. My father did. Luca did. Every man who ever thought I was just a bargaining chip—they did this."
His throat moved with the force of what he was swallowing back. "And what if I lose you because of them?"
"Then at least I was finally mine before I was taken."
She stepped closer now, pressing her hand flat against his chest. His heartbeat thudded under her palm. Unsteady. Real.
"I know what you're thinking," she said. "You're planning to send me away. Somewhere safe. Somewhere far."
His silence was confirmation.
"I won't go," she said.
"Serena—"
"I won't go," she repeated, stronger now. "Because if I leave, I'm saying I can't fight for us. And I can. I want to. I won't run from you, Damon—not even if everything burns."
He grabbed her wrist gently, as if she were glass. "This isn't just about you anymore. If you stay, your name will be dragged into courtrooms, into headlines. You'll be hunted by people who don't care if you bleed. You'll be hated for loving me."
"I've already survived worse."
"That doesn't mean you have to survive this."
"But I want to," she said, tears rising. "With you. I don't care if it's ugly. I don't care if it hurts. I just… I want something that's mine. Not arranged. Not expected. Not transactional. Just real."
He pulled her into his arms. Not like a man claiming something fragile, but like someone afraid the person he loved might be taken at any second.
"You wreck me," he whispered into her hair. "You undo every part of me I spent years keeping buried."
"Then let's stop burying things," she murmured.
He kissed her then—deep, consuming. A kiss full of apologies, promises, rage, and devotion. His hands tangled in her hair. Her fingers slipped under his shirt, clutching his scars.
They didn't make love that night to forget.
They made love because it might be the last time they could touch without guilt. Without the world tearing them apart.
—
Later, she lay in his bed, facing him. Their bodies curled like a secret inside the storm.
And when she finally spoke, it was in a whisper so soft he almost missed it.
"Will you still want me… if everything changes?"
He didn't answer at first. He just looked at her—really looked. At the fire in her eyes, the tremble in her breath, the ache of someone who'd spent her whole life being told she was too much.
"Yes," he said. "Even if the whole world turns on us. I'll still want you."
She reached for his hand, threading her fingers through his. "Then whatever comes… we face it together."
And in that moment, it wasn't the danger that felt terrifying.
It was the hope.