I had never truly understood what it meant to be invisible until I slept curled on the cold pavement beside a pile of rags that used to be a man.

A patch of cardboard separated my back from the grit of the alley. I shared the corner with three people who had likely seen more winters than they had birthdays. Hippies, or ex-hippies, or whatever they called themselves now. Two women and one man who smelled like tobacco and regret. The woman closest to me kept mumbling about the colors in the sky, even though the sky was a sick, choked gray.

My coat barely reached my thighs. My boots were caked in sludge. I pulled the sleeves of Alex's hoodie tighter around my wrists. It still smelled like him. Faintly. Like cedar, smoke, and the last good thing I remembered.

Dan’s voice echoed again in my head.

"You are just like her. Just like Roselyn. A whore. That is all you will ever be."

Then came the kick. Sharp. Cruel. The kind that was not meant to hurt just your body, but to crack your soul in half.

I curled into myself.

And then I saw Alex again. The look in his eyes when he played the video. Hurt. Rage. Confusion. The mix of it nearly drowned me. I was the cause. I had no excuse.

But the way he stared at me... it was the same look Dan once gave my mother before he slammed her head into a wall. The same edge. That fine, thin line between love and destruction.

I was not going to wait around to see which side Alex landed on.

I had to leave. I had to.

Even though my chest ached with every breath, even though part of me wanted to run back, knock on the door, fall into his arms and scream, "Please, I did not mean to. Please, do not give up on us."

But it was too late. And maybe he was never truly mine to begin with.

"You alright, sugar?" one of the older women asked me. Her hair was matted into clumps, silver and dirt woven together like roots. Her eyes were kinder than I expected.

"I am fine," I whispered.

She crouched beside me. Her hands were covered in fingerless gloves and she held something wrapped in foil.

"You hungry? You look pale."

"No, thank you."

Her face changed in an instant. The lines in her forehead deepened.

"Think you are better than us, do you? Too pretty for our food?"

I shook my head quickly. "I am just not hungry."

"Liar. You are starving. You think I cannot see it? I was starving for twenty years before I learned how to chew on pride."

She shoved the foil-wrapped thing toward me. I did not take it.

Then she snapped.

"Ungrateful brat! Come here with your soft lips and think you are above us! Probably whoring around in a mansion before you ended up here. I see your type. You think because you have boots and a coat you are still better than dirt."

She lunged.

I flinched, too slow to scramble up, but before she could grab my hair, someone stepped between us.

I saw a flash of leather. A strong arm. The woman stumbled back as though she had hit a wall.

"Back off," a voice growled.

I blinked.

Marco.

His suit was too clean for this alley. His shoes shined. His hair was slicked back and his eyes... those sharp, calculating eyes that saw through lies for a living... they softened when he looked at me.

"Millie. Come with me. Now."

I should have hesitated. I should have questioned why he was there or how he found me.

But instead, I reached out with the last ounce of strength I had left, and he pulled me to my feet like a father catching a child before they fell.

He led me away from the alley. The other two hippies muttered under their breath. The aggressive woman kept cursing behind us. Marco said nothing until we turned the corner.

Then, he looked at me, really looked.

"What the hell are you doing out here?"

"Hiding."

"From who? Alex? Or yourself?"

I looked away.

"I am not taking you back to him. Not yet."

My stomach twisted.

"You are not?"

He shook his head. "You need someone to teach you how to survive. Not just physically. Emotionally. Tactically. Your heart is bleeding all over the place, and I doubt you even know how much you are giving away."

My lips trembled. I had no answer.

Marco sighed. He took off his coat and draped it over my shoulders.

"You remind me of someone I once knew," he said quietly.

"Who?"

He didn’t reply my question.

"Well that story is for another time. Right now, you need to eat. Then we talk. About your future. About power. Because you need it to be a woman that cannot be pushed aroundby anyone."

The word "power" clung to the air between us.

My legs were shaky, but I followed him anyway.

I did not look back.

I had already buried too many ghosts in that alley.

As we entered the backseat of Marco's waiting car, I noticed the man in the front passenger seat.

He turned around slowly.

Sharp jaw. Piercing green eyes.

"This is Nico Del Ruca," Marco said, watching me carefully.

Nico gave me a wolfish smile. "I have heard a lot about you, Millie."