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I cross the threshold of the weed-choked property, heart drumming so loudly I’m sure they’ll hear. My stomach lurches. Every instinct screams to turn around, to run back to her. But I keep walking.

Because I’ll trade myself for her a hundred times over if it means she stays free.

Because love, real love, doesn’t always mean staying.

Sometimes…it means walking into the dark alone.

There’s no chance to knock, no chance to hesitate—two enforcers slip from the shadows like wraiths, their hands closing around my arms in the same breath. I don’t flinch, but my breath hitches, a startled cry rising in my throat before I bite it down. I have to do this. For Roan.

One of them leans in, breath hot against my cheek. “Didn’t think we’d see your pretty face so soon,” he sneers.

Damaris. His voice drips with familiarity, twisted now with cruel amusement. The other one is silent, but his grip bites into my elbow hard enough to leave bruises.

They drag me through a battered door that creaks and groans like it’s protesting my return. The scent hits me first—mildewed curtains and splintered wood, but underneath it, that thick, metallic tang that pierces my senses. Blood. Fresh. My stomach knots.

I’m paraded through a grand foyer that’s barely clinging to its former glory. Dust hangs heavy in the air, lit by slivers of moonlight through broken windows. What furniture remains is splintered, torn, or bloodstained. It’s as if the house itself has been feeding.

They shove me forward. Not rough enough to bruise, but firm enough to remind me who is in control.

The enforcer on my right—Tallen, I think—peels off and disappears down a long hallway. His boots echo against the cracked tiles as he goes to fetch her.

My mother.

That word claws something raw and buried from inside me.

When Damaris finally releases me, I don’t stumble. I stand still. I keep my chin up, even though my palms are clammy and my stomach twists like I’ve swallowed stones.

Damaris stays behind, lingering a few paces away. He doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t need to. He just watches. Always watching.

I’m back in the den.

The center of the web.

And this was always going to happen, wasn’t it?

But I didn’t expect it to feel like this—like every cell in my body is screaming for Roan. For her arms. Her voice. Her steadiness.

I told myself I had to protect her. That walking into this place meant keeping her safe. Now that I’m here, caged and alone, I realize just how much of myself I left behind in that bed.

Damaris shifts slightly, arms crossed, weight resting on one hip like a bored vulture. His expression is unreadable—apathetic, maybe. Or patient.

He’s my mother’s favorite. That loyalty’s carved into every inch of him.

I wrap my arms around myself. Not to protect. To contain.

Because every instinct is screaming to run once more.

But I won’t.

Not this time.

Not while I have even an inch of strength left in me.

The house groans—an old, aching sound that rattles somewhere deep in the bones of the walls. Damaris glances toward the hall, then back at me, and I swear I see the ghost of a smirk.

“Didn’t think you had it in you,” he murmurs.

I don't respond, don’t give him the satisfaction. I just keep staring forward, hands clenched, waiting.