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I look her dead in the eye. “I love you,” I repeat, hoarse. “Fuck. I didn’t mean to. But I do.”
Her mouth opens. A beat of stunned silence.
But before she can speak?—
The lights go out.
And a second later, the worldexplodes.
The blast rocks the street outside, a white-hot roar that sends us both diving to the floor as the windows blow inward and the air fills with fire and rubble.
CHAPTER 18
Dahlia
Another safehouse. Higher north. Much colder than the last. And not just in temperature—though it’s nestled high in the hills, wrapped in mist and ancient stone like a tomb—but in something deeper. In the silence. The shadows. In everything we’ve stopped saying.
Dante hasn’t spoken since we arrived.
He drove like a man possessed. Every muscle tight, every breath a fight. The bloodstains on his shirt are dry now, crusted over the ridges of his abdomen, stiff with smoke and something more brutal.
Something that doesn’t wash out.
I didn’t ask where we were going. I didn’t ask if his hand still hurt from taking the brunt of the collapsing wall when he shoved me out of the way. I didn’t ask if the security team made it out okay.
Because the look in his eyes said everything.
Because sometimes silence is the loudest fucking thing in the room.
When I flip the light switch, it flickers. Once. Twice. Then catches. The wiring is old—like everything in this place—but functional. The kitchen smells faintly of cedar and cold iron, the scent of old woodsmoke and storms clinging to the walls like ghosts.
I drop my bag on the counter. My fingers won’t stop trembling.
We’re alive.
Barely.
“You should shower,” Dante says behind me.
His voice is hoarse. Strained. Like he’s been screaming inside his own head for hours.
I nod. But I don’t move.
He steps closer. Not touching and not surrounding me the way he used to—like I belonged to his orbit, like he’d rearrange the world just to keep me centered. No. He just stands there. Tense. Quiet.
Waiting for me to say something that might make this survivable.
Like he’s not sure he’s allowed to care anymore after he told me he loved me,three fucking times, and I said nothing. Because the weight of it feels like a thousand collars.
“I’ll check the perimeter,” he mutters, already turning.
“Dante.”
He stops.
I say just that. His name. But it vibrates through the space between us like a bomb ticking down. I don’t even know what I want to say.
My throat is thick with unshed screams. With rabid need. With questions I don’t know if I want the answers to.