ADANNA POV (point of view)
The apartment is too quiet. Not the empty kind.... the charged kind. The kind that presses against your skin and makes every breath feel louder than it should.
Darian moves through the space like he's afraid to disturb something fragile. He locks the door. Checks the windows. Sets his phone face down on the counter.
Then he finally looks at me.
Not the scan for threats look. Not the soldier's glance.
Just… me.
"You're safe here," he says, softer than I've ever heard him.
I nod, but my body hasn't caught up to the words yet. My nerves are still buzzing, Eden still humming faintly in the back of my mind like a tide that hasn't fully gone out.
He pours two glasses of water and hands me one, our fingers brush, it's small and accidental.
My breath stutters anyway and he notices.
"You don't have to be strong right now," he says quietly and that's when it breaks.
