For a moment, I'd been afraid of him. Truly afraid, in a way I hadn't been since I was human. This wasn't the controlled, aristocratic vampire who'd saved me in an alley or trained me in his compound. This was something savage, a predator wearing a man's skin.
Then his eyes found mine, and the blackness receded. What replaced it was almost worse, naked terror. Likehewas the one who'd almost died.
I remember him lifting me. The impossible gentleness of it, cradling me against his chest like I weighed nothing, like I was something fragile and precious. His voice in my ear, rough and broken:I thought I'd lost you. I couldn't wait. I heard them surround you, and I, I've never moved that fast.
The way his hands shook while Dalton examined me. The way he wouldn't let go of my hand when they set my shoulder. The way he brushed the hair from my face with fingers that trembled, his touch so tender it made my chest ache.
And then the realization. The questions I asked that led to answers I didn't want.
You knew they might come for me tonight.
Yes.
And you sent me anyway.
I open my eyes and stare at the ceiling.
How can someone hold you like you're the most important thing in the world and also use you as bait without telling you? How can tenderness and betrayal exist in the same person, the same hands, the same voice?
I don't understand him. I'm not sure I ever will.
I sit up slowly, testing my body. The ribs that were broken last night have knitted back together, tender when I press them, butsolid. My shoulder rotates smoothly, only a ghost of stiffness where the joint was dislocated. The cuts and bruises have faded to nothing.
Vampire healing. At least something about this existence is useful.
The medical wing is quiet. Through the window, I can see full darkness; night has fallen. I slept through the entire day, my body demanding the dormancy it needed to repair itself.
I swing my legs over the side of the bed and stand. A little unsteady, but functional. Someone left clean clothes folded on the chair, my clothes, from my room. Black leggings, a soft gray sweater. Someone was thinking about my comfort.
I try not to wonder if it was him.
I'm pulling the sweater over my head when I hear footsteps in the corridor. Measured. Deliberate. I know that cadence.
Something tightens in my chest despite everything. My body hasn't caught up with my anger yet.
The door opens before I can finish dressing.
Maximus steps inside and stops dead.
I'm standing there with the sweater bunched around my shoulders, arms tangled in the fabric, wearing nothing but a bra from the waist up. For a frozen moment, neither of us moves.
His eyes drop. And stay.
I watch it happen, the way his gaze traces the line of my collarbone, slides down to the swell of my breasts against black lace, lingers on the curve of my waist, the bare skin of my stomach. There's nothing controlled about it. Nothing measured or deliberate. He looks at me like a man dying of thirst looks at water, like he's forgotten every rule he's ever made for himself.
His lips part. His hands curl into fists at his sides.
Then he seems to remember himself. He turns his head sharply to the side, jaw tight, a muscle feathering in his cheek.
"I should have knocked." His voice is rough. Wrecked.
"Yes. You should have."
I take my time pulling the sweater down, smoothing the fabric over my hips. I don't rush. Let him stand there, uncomfortable, not looking at me. After everything he's done, this small moment of power feels earned.
"You can turn around now."
He does, but something has shifted. The hollowness is still there, the exhaustion, but he won't meet my eyes directly. His control is back in place, but I saw what was underneath. Just for a moment.
