The cold night air should have felt like freedom.
Instead, the bond tightened.
Not in comfort. Not in triumph. In warning.
I faltered mid-step, my breath catching as a sharp, unfamiliar pressure slid through the connection between the three of us. Dominic felt it instantly — his hand closed around mine, grip iron-strong. Dane turned, scanning the courtyard, his power already flaring outward like a drawn blade.
“What is it?” Dominic asked quietly, not aloud, but through the bond.
I shook my head. I don’t know. The truth scared me. I had never not known before.
Behind us, stone shifted.
A single set of footsteps echoed across the courtyard — measured, unhurried, deliberate.
“Leaving so soon?”
Thorne stepped from beneath the archway, the torchlight catching the lines of his weathered
