Then Rack’s voice cut through it.
“Please, Calix… She’s… she’s my flame. I can’t lose her.”
The words didn’t just land, they fractured something inside me. My head snapped toward him, their meaning slamming into place too fast, too sharp.
My flame.
The room seemed to tilt. My eyes dropped. His hands wrapped around hers, holding on like letting go would break him, and something ugly twisted deep in my gut. That monstrous side of me roared in my ears.
Her! Of all people it had to be her.
A short, hollow breath pushed out of me as my mind tried to catch up, to process how the one person who had managed to get under my skin in a single night, the one person I was thinking of trying to start some kind of future with… now belonged to him.
To my best friend. Mybrother.
It would be laughable if it didn’t feel like it was ripping something straight out of my chest. I wanted to punch something, and in the same breath escape this moment and hide away until the pain receded.
I dragged a hand down my face, jaw tightening hard enough to ache as the thought circled relentlessly.
Nothing had ever been out of reach for me. Not once. I was Calix fucking Winstale, one of the five bosses of the Syndicate. If I wanted something, I got it. That was just how the world worked… until now.
My gaze flicked back to Rack.
He looked wrecked. Eyes sharp with desperation, shoulders tense like he was holding himself together by force alone. Something in me recoiled at the sight. I’d never seen him like that. Never wanted to.
And still… he was asking me to do this.
To save her. To tie myself to her in a way that could never be undone… just to hand her back to him, knowing how I felt.
The word “no” sat right there, pressing at the back of my teeth. It would’ve been easy. It would’ve been?—
A breath hitched. Soft. Weak.
My head snapped back to her. All hesitation burned away, replaced by something colder, sharper. Decision.
“Move,” I said, already stepping forward.
Rack didn’t argue. Didn’t hesitate. He shifted immediately, giving me space, even though I could feel his presence still anchored to her.
I climbed onto the bed, straddling her, as my focus narrowed. Everything else, the anger, the frustration, the bitter twist in my chest, all of it got shoved down.
This was about survival. Nothing else.
And still… as I leaned over her, my fingers brushing her hair back from her neck, the thoughts didn’t fully quiet.
Flame.
Mate.
The words dragged something old to the surface. To the night I drank myself numb, drowning in invisible pain over a woman who had thrown me away for just the chance at that word. Back before I got this tattoo put on my neck. Even if it was invisible, I could feel the faint workings of magic just beneath the skin, reminding me that I’d chosen not to have a mate.
And now I was about to give it to him.
My jaw tightened as I looked down at her again.
Her skin had gone too pale. Too still. There wasn’t time for this.
I shifted closer, one arm sliding beneath her shoulders, lifting her just enough to bring her to me. My other hand steadied her, fingers splayed along her spine, holding her together as best I could.
