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I wrapped a towel around myself and stepped into the bedroom. Everything was exactly where I’d left it. The bed. My clothes. The pillow I’d held against my chest when I’d wanted to scream. The dresser and on top of it—The Phantom of the Opera.

I stopped.

Black ink waited between those pages. So did Alaric’s words. I crossed the room and picked it up. Opened the cover.

This is where your attention belongs.

My throat tightened.

His handwriting.

The first thing he’d given me that’d felt like it was more than protection. Something chosen… for me. I ran my thumb beneath the words.

“Why couldn’t you just tell me?”

Silence answered.

Of course it did.

I turned several pages.

Black ink.

Thick.

Violent.

Have you found it?

I had.

Another page.

The place he keeps the truth.

I closed the book and held it against my chest. Two men lived inside those pages now. One who’d taught me what safety had felt like and one who taught me how easily it could become something else.

I hated the second man.

God, I fucking hated him.

That mattered, right?

I needed to remember that.

My hand moved automatically, tracing the scar line down my other thumb. I didn’t trust the Clove Man. Not at all. I knew what he was. Knew the way he moved. Knew the way he liked to break me. I shook my head. I wasn’t doing this because I believed him. I was going because Alaric had taken every other path away from me.

But this.

This choice.

This was still mine.

That mattered.

It had to.

My gaze moved around the room. Clothes. Right. I dressed. Dark pants. Sweater. Boots. Nothing I wouldn’t wear tomorrow. Because there would be a tomorrow. I’d come back.