The car ride back to her place was taken in silence. The hard set to Diego’s jaw made Rosalyn reluctant to speak, even as guilt and self-recrimination almost choked her. She wanted so badly to apologise, to find absolution from her mistake, but fear stopped her from even bringing it up.

It was easier to stay silent, to let Diego go from her life, even as her heart ached at the thought. Could she let him walk away without even trying to explain?

Diego pulled up outside the front of her apartment building and waited, tapping his fingers against the steering wheel.

“Diego—” she tried.

“You should leave town.”

“What?”

“You heard what McCready said. He wants you dead. I don’t want to have to kill you, but McCready will make it more painful than I would.”

Rosalyn eyed his profile as he stared straight ahead, noting the tick in his jaw. The orange glow from the streetlight played across his features, casting them in dramatic shadow. “You wouldn’t,” she whispered, but her words weren’t steady.

He slanted a glance to her then. “Wouldn’t I? You know I’m capable of taking a life.”

Rosalyn gasped at the hardness in his words and expression. Gone was the sweet, caring man she’d discovered over the last week. This was Diego the criminal, gang member, ex-con. The betrayed lover.

“I don’t believe you,” she said as tears burned in her eyes. “I know I made a mistake, but—”

“Do you? Do you know what you’ve done? After everything I’ve told you, everything I confided to you… My life is in danger now. People will be gunning for me, trying to kill me.”

“Surely not! I used a pseudonym. And I left out the true specifics.”

His nostrils flared in anger and disgust. “McCready knew instantly you were talking about me, and he knows nothing of my history. You didn’t do half so good a job as you thought of disguising my identity.”

Pain seized her chest. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I wrote the article when I was upset with you—I thought you were a murderer—and sent it without thinking. Minutes later I emailed my boss telling him not to publish. I sent in a different article instead, but he refused to use it. I swear I never meant for this version to go live.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Was your replacement article on a different topic?”

She swallowed. “Not exactly, but it had this whole other angle—”

“Not interested,” he cut her off. “This second article, was it written before or after I told you about Victor and Raoul?”

Rosalyn swallowed. Somehow this betrayal, not telling him about the articles once the two of them had reached a good place, stung her guilty conscience far more than anything else.

“After,” she whispered.

A disgusted sound left his lips.

“I only didn’t tell you because you were so raw after your confession. Since I changed the article to something else—something barely related to the fights—I didn’t think it would affect you. But then Anthony printed the wrong one and it all fell apart.”

“And why didn’t you tell me then? I’ve been walking around for two days with a target on my back and no warning. I would’ve liked to know my life was in danger.”

“But it isn’t! Nothing’s happened. The things you’re afraid of might never come to pass. You don’t know for sure anyone is after you.”

He rolled his eyes. “Except McCready. He knows I was responsible for the leaks.”

“But you’re still alive,” she pressed. “Even he didn’t want you dead.”

Diego dismissed that with a shake of his head. “Regardless of the outcome, it still doesn’t forgive what you did. Not just to me, but to all the men fighting in that cage. This is our livelihood you’ve jeopardised. Most of the men who fight—like me—don’t have a choice in what we do. And if the fights get shut down because you were a nosy, lying, fame-hungry reporter, those men are completely fucked. Do you get that?”

“I didn’t think.” Tears streamed down her cheeks unchecked. She deserved his anger, deserved everything he threw at her. She’d made a mistake in anger, and then compounded it by lying. She knew that, couldn’t deny it.

“You’re right, you didn’t. You live in your little ivory tower and think you’re better than us. That you can judge us for what we have to do to survive.”

“My articles were both very measured—” she tried.

“And written without our permission.”

She took a deep breath, trying to steady herself. Her hands shook with emotion overwhelm and she clenched them into fists to stop the tremble. “I’ve worked so hard for this job—this life. It’s all I’ve wanted. I dragged myself out of foster care hell to have a chance at an article like this one. My boss gave me one shot—one—and I had to take it. Would you have consented to an interview if I’d asked?”

“No. And there’s a reason for that,” he told her snidely.

“Well, there’s a reason I acted the way I did, too. This was a chance of a lifetime.”

“Whose lifetime?”

“Mine,” she cried. “I have fought and fought for an opportunity like this. Pulled myself out of the gutter, shed myself of the thick, grasping darkness of my past. For this. To tell the stories of forgotten people like you. Like I was.”

He glared at her, but something sparked in his eyes, maybe a shard of understanding. But it was quickly gone.

“Maybe we were forgotten for a reason,” he said.

Rosalyn shook her head. “No. I don’t believe that. You all deserve better. Maybe you’ve become immune to it, but you said yourself people die in these fights. No one should have to risk that simply to survive. I thought if I could write the article, and show the desperation of these fighters, maybe people would help.”

He scoffed. “Because you think everyone is so good and wonderful? Always so willing to help? Not a chance.”

“You might not think there’s a chance, but I do. It’s happened before. I honestly wasn’t really thinking about my career when I wrote this article, other than the power I had to help in any way I could. I was thinking about you, and this life, and all the men forced into it.”

“You wanted to save us?”

“Yes.” She shook her head. “I don’t know. Maybe. But I thought it was worth a try.”

“You still used me. Endangered me.”

“Yes, maybe when I initially pitched this article, I didn’t know who any of you were, and why you’d choose to do this. I didn’t exactly see you as people with lives and difficult choices ahead. And when I wrote the article, I didn’t know why you were in hiding. You hadn’t told me about Victor, or his son. I thought you were running from a past you didn’t want to face. All I knew was you were a fascinating man with a story to tell.”

“A story that would benefit you, not me.”

“It wasn’t meant to be like that. I wanted to help.”

“So all those nights you were pumping me for information was what? Pillow talk?”

“No, I genuinely wanted—want—to know you.”

He scoffed. “You betrayed us. You didn’t ask us for our consent, or tell us why you were really there. You didn’t tell me.”

A crack opened in his armour of fury, showing the hurt and vulnerability beneath. He’d opened up to her, and she’d betrayed him. Unintentionally, sure. But intention didn’t always matter.

Taking a chance, Rosalyn leaned across the centre console and placed a gentle hand on his arm. “Nothing that happened between us was a lie,” she murmured.

He stared at her hand for a long moment, emotions warring on his face. Without her permission, hope bubbled within her. Maybe he could still forgive her. Maybe there was a chance.

Then, he shook her off and squeezed his hands tighter around the steering wheel. Rosalyn’s heart sank to her toes.

“Just get out,” he told her, sounding tired and worn.

“But…” she trailed off when he sucked in an angry breath.

“Get out of my life, get out of this city, maybe even the country. That is, if you want to live.”

“I know you still care,” she said, even as she opened the car door.

His head whipped around so he could glare at her. “I don’t care about you. I just don’t want another death on my conscience.”

Rosalyn’s stomach clenched. She slid out of the car and shut the door behind her. The truck sped off down the street and disappeared at the next turn, leaving Rosalyn standing in the cold night air, completely alone.