Because he’smine.
The house comes into view through the trees, and my breath catches hard in my throat.
It looks exactly the same. Not a single crack in the stone. Every window intact. The front door solid and dark, waiting like it never witnessed blood and screams and the moment my entire world fractured.
The sight of it hits me harder than I expected—a sharp, stunning ache that lodges itself right behind my ribs. This place should be ruined. Itwasruined. And yet here it stands, perfect and untouched, as if the massacre never happened. As if Reth had simply paused time and put everything back the way it was before he sent us away.
The car rolls to a stop. I don’t move. I can’t.
“The windows,” I whisper, voice cracking.
Ian glances over from the front seat. His jaw tightens as his eyes find the house. Something raw flickers across his face before he locks it down. “Yeah.”
“Everything’s… fixed.”
Ian exhales slowly. “Reth had it sorted. Within a week, apparently.”
A week.
Between everything going on, he put it back together. Like a promise. Like a message left behind in case we ever made it back.
Tears burn my eyes. I bite them back viciously as I pushthe car door open and step out onto the gravel.
The mountain air is cold and crisp, carrying the scent of pine and stone and memories that hurt to breathe in. I stare at the house, at the place where I chose him, where I choseus, and the absence of him beside me feels like a living wound.
Ian opens the front door. I follow. My hands find the frame on either side, and I just stand there breathing it in, the way you breathe in something you thought you'd lost, slowly, deliberately, trying to take in enough to store somewhere safe.
The last time I stood right here, I had an impossible choice in front of me – run, or stay with the dangerous, beautiful monster who had stolen my heart and refused to give it back.
I stayed.
I stayed, and I have never regretted it for a single second.
Because he’s worth every scar. Every tear. Every risk. And I will tear this continent apart with my bare hands if that’s what it takes to bring him home.
"You okay?" Ian says from somewhere.
"Give me a minute."
He gives me a minute, and my throat does something complicated.
I step inside, and it’s exactly as I remember it. The floor, the light, the quality of silence this house keeps—engineered, weighted, the kind that doesn't occur naturally but that you stop noticing after a while. I stood in this hallway terrified, furious, cataloguing exits that didn't exist.
“You don’t win this by fighting me, Sophia.”
Words that meant something then but mean something entirely different now. It was neverabout fighting for survival. It was about fighting to not fall for him as deeply as I did.
I hear Ian and Andrei talking somewhere deeper in the house—low voices, clipped words, the quiet rhythm of strategy and violence. Planning. Preparing. Deciding how far they’re willing to go to bring him home.
I wipe the tears from my cheeks with the back of my hand and force myself to move through the house. Everything about it is pure nostalgia wrapped in razor wire.
Every corner, every hallway, every piece of furniture hits me like a memory I can’t outrun. The faint scent of cedar and smoke that still lingers in the air, the ghost of him everywhere I look.
The kitchen when he grabbed the knife, not feeling the cut, not caring that he was bleeding.
The living room floor where I slept, where he whispered,“This is not what I wanted.”I didn’t know what he meant by that. Now I do. He never meant to hurt me. Never meant for me to get caught up in his chaos. But here I am, caught up his chaos and unable to imagine my world without it.
I climb the stairs slowly, fingers trailing along the banister, each step pulling me deeper into the past. The house is too quiet. Too still. Like it’s holding its breath, waiting for its creator.
