The memories of Sergio treating me had long faded, but looking at him now, kneeling on the floor with something raw and exposed in his eyes, it felt like he was the one who needed saving. Answering him wasn’t the hard part — I just couldn’t afford to light a spark near whatever was burning inside him. The safest thing was to meet him where he was. "A lot of things are still blurry for me. Whether it’s you or Lewis, both are just names without faces attached. To me, you’re my doctor. That’s all I have."

I gently pulled my hand from his and rested it on my stomach. "Right now, the only thing I’m focused on is getting these babies here safely."

He seemed to settle at that — maybe because it meant he and Lewis were standing on the same blank ground in my mind, neither one ahead of the other.

"I understand, Coco. I’m not trying to pressure you. I just want a fair shot," he said quietly. He rose to his feet, switched on the small lamp beside the bed, and looked at me steadily. "I was the one who knew you first."

Something in me stirred — a pull toward a piece of my story I no longer had access to. I shifted my position and let him draw the blanket over me without protest. In that moment, strange as it was, his presence felt more stable than anything waiting downstairs. Compared to the two people down there, Sergio felt almost safe.

He locked the door, pulled out a spare blanket, and made himself a bed on the floor the same way he must have done before. I watched him in the dim light. He was composed, good-looking in that quiet, deliberate way — the kind of man who never had to try. So what had driven him to this? To take a pregnant, bonded woman and keep her hidden away?

Some would call it madness. But he’d never once raised a hand to me, never crossed a line. Whatever this was, it wasn’t cruelty.

It wasn’t until the room had gone dark and his breathing had slowed that I finally spoke. "Tell me about the past. Tell me why you feel the way you do about me."

A beat of silence. Then — "Alright."

His voice was soft in the dark, unhurried, like someone who had been carrying a story for a long time and finally had somewhere to put it. "At first, you were just another patient. The first time you walked in, you were wearing a fitted blazer, low heels, a briefcase in hand. You didn’t look like someone coming in for help. You looked like you were there to close a deal."

I almost smiled at the image, even though I couldn’t remember it.

"I’ve worked with a lot of people. But none like you. You were calm, precise. Your eyes were clear — no obvious fracture showing on the surface." He paused. "But the assessments told a different story. You were dealing with more than most people could carry — and underneath it all, a bipolar disorder that had gone unaddressed for years. You were living in a kind of darkness that had no visible edges. And yet —" His voice shifted slightly. "You were still showing up every week to spend time with the kids at the care home. Still giving, even when you had nothing left."

I lay still, listening.

"I was curious at first. That’s all it was — professional curiosity. I grew up around people at their worst, and I had convinced myself that real selflessness didn’t exist. That everyone eventually breaks, withdraws, turns inward. Most people in your condition do. But you weren’t collapsing inward. You were still reaching outward. And I —" He let out a short, humorless sound. "I watched you like it was a study. I wanted to see how long you could hold."

I tightened my grip on the blanket.

"I know how that sounds. I was awful. I watched your suffering the way someone watches a flame — waiting for it to go out. And eventually, it started to. You stopped smiling between sessions. You came in more often. The insomnia got worse, the emotional breaks came faster, and then came the thoughts of not wanting to be here at all. I thought — I actually thought I had been right. That you had finally surrendered." A long pause. "But something had shifted in me without my realizing it. I didn’t want to watch you fall anymore. I wanted to be the one to catch you."

The room held the silence for a moment.

"I didn’t know at the time what Wisteria actually was, or how deep the setup went. I thought once you saw through Julian and cut him loose, I could help you rebuild. Then I got the call overseas that you’d disappeared. I was on a flight back before the day was out." His voice steadied again, pulling itself together. "I tracked down the person who filed the report. I started pulling threads. That’s when I realized an organization was involved — one I recognized."

"You knew them?" I asked quietly.

"From a long time ago. I saw enough when I was young to walk away completely — changed my name, cut every tie. I would never have gone near them again. But I needed to find you." He exhaled. "And when I did find you... you weren’t whole. What they had done to you —" His voice broke at the edge and he steadied it again. "When you reached out to me as Riley, I wanted to make it right. I agreed to work with you. But the moment I saw you at the scene — the way you held yourself, the way your eyes moved — I knew. I knew it was you."

I didn’t say anything. I understood what he felt. But I had a bond already, and two lives depending on that bond holding. I didn’t need saving — I needed to get back.

"Will they hurt me?" I asked, steering us away from the weight of everything he’d just laid down. "Your parents."

"I won’t let them get close enough to try. They’re gone by morning. Lewis has already taken apart most of their network, but the ones who got away are the most dangerous. If you go back to his side right now, you become a target. They’ll use you to get to him." His tone was firm, but not unkind. "Stay here, Coco. Have your babies somewhere safe. That’s all I’m asking."

"But Lewis —"

"Time does its work. It’s late. Rest."

I knew he meant it. The concern was real. But so was the selfishness sitting underneath it, quiet and unacknowledged. I didn’t hold it against him — I just knew what it meant. I had to find a way to reach Lewis.

Whatever it took.