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My eyes snap open to find onyx skin inches from my face. Dante perches on the edge of my bed, wings curved protectively around me. Even his injured one stretches to shelter me despite the obvious pain it causes him.

“How did you…?” My voice emerges as a croak.

“I…” His gaze darts from mine. I wonder what he’s hiding, but his expression is so sincere, so pained; I can’t help but trust him. His skin flickers between crimson and black. “When I can’t sleep, I sometimes wander the hallways. I was passing your door and heard you shouting.”

“I’m fine,” the words come automatically—a lifetime of keeping emotions hidden. “The sedatives they used sometimes cause vivid recall of—”

“Stop.” His tail curls around my waist, solid and grounding. “You don’t have to analyze everything. Sometimes it’s okay to just… feel.”

Although he’s wrong about that, the gentle understanding in his voice breaks something loose in my chest. Before I can stop myself, I’m pressing my face into his shoulder, breathing in his familiar scent as tears finally come.

His wings tighten around me as I shake apart in his arms. No data collection. No clinical observations. Just the safety of his embrace as years of carefully maintained control crumble.

“Shh,” he murmurs, his tail wrapping more securely around my waist. “You’re safe now. No one’s going to hurt you again.”

The conviction in his voicemakes fresh tears spill. My fingers clutch at his shirt, and I feel his sharp intake of breath at the contact. His temperature spikes—I should be documenting this, analyzing the physiological response patterns, but all I can focus on is how right, how safe, it feels to be in his arms.

“I keep seeing their faces,” I whisper against his chest. “Hearing their voices. The things they—” My voice breaks.

“Look at me.” His clawed finger lifts my chin, and his gaze—deep red as molten garnets—captures me. “You survived. You’re stronger than they could ever understand.”

Something in his expression makes my breath catch. The way he’s looking at me… it defies all my careful categorizations, all my attempts to quantify the connection growing between us.

“Will you…” I swallow hard, scientific precision deserting me. “Could you stay? Just until I fall asleep?”

His skin ripples with an emotion I’m too exhausted to analyze. Instead of answering, he shifts us both until we’re lying down, his uninjured wing draped over me like a living blanket. Though it looks like leather, it feels soft and velvety.

As his wing settles around me, a strange sense of rightness washes over me. The headache that’s been my constant companion all day suddenly eases, and my racing heart begins to steady itself. It’s not just comfort—it’s something physiological, something I should be documenting. Yet for once, I don’t reach for my tablet.

“Your heart rate is normalizing,” he observes softly. His scientific observation is laced with so much affection. “And your skin temperature is adjusting to match mine.”

“There’s a term for this phenomenon in human medicine,” I murmur, scientific curiosity briefly overcoming my exhaustion. “Co-regulation. Though this seems more… intense.” Searching for the right words. “It’s almost as if our bodies are communicating on a cellular level.”

He tenses slightly, then deliberately relaxes. “You should rest. Scientific theories can wait until morning.”

I nestle closer, seeking his warmth. Whatever is happening between us pulses with comfort, though I don’t know what it means yet. His arm curls around me, pulling me against his chest as his tail winds securely around my waist.

“Thank you,” I whisper, my fingers tracing the delicate veins in his wing where it shelters me. “For understanding. For not asking too many questions.”

“I know something about nightmares,” he says softly, his breath warm against my hair. “About memories that follow you into sleep.”

My scientific mind wants to catalog this new information, to ask him about his dreams, but exhaustion is pulling me under. Instead, I simply turn my face into his chest, breathing in his scent.

His free hand comes up to stroke my hair, claws carefully retracted as his fingers work through the silver and lavender strands. The gentle, repetitive motion soothes me more effectively than any sedative.

“Your temperature is normalizing,” he observes, his voice a low rumble I can feel against my cheek. “Heart rate decreasing to standard resting parameters.”

I smile against his chest. “Now who’s the scientist?”

His quiet laugh vibrates through me, and I feel his lips press briefly against the top of my head—so gentle I might have imagined it if not for the way his tail tightens almost imperceptibly around my waist.

“I’ve learned from the best,” he murmurs.

We fall silent then, his wing adjusting slightly to cover me more completely as a chill runs through the chamber. I’ve never felt so protected, so safe, despite knowing all the reasons I shouldn’t. The hunter’s daughter and the Jersey Devil—a statistical improbability in every way.

“Dante?” My voice is thick with approaching sleep.

“Hmm?” The sound vibrates through his chest beneath my ear.