ROMAN POV
I shut the door harder than I meant to, the latch clicking in the silence like a judge’s gavel.
Sage didn’t say anything at first. He moved stiffly toward his cot, shoulders tight. There was a fine tremor in his fingers he was trying to hide.
I watched him. Watched him—this boy who had no business being here, who had seen too much of me, who should have been running in the opposite direction.
But he wasn’t.
He just sat down and looked at me.
And for one foolish, cursed moment, I let myself look back.
The firelight made the healing cut on his temple stand out in sharp relief. His hair was mussed from the wind, that ridiculous too-large tunic hanging crookedly on his frame.
Pathetic.
Weak.
But stubborn as the devil himself.
I exhaled slowly.
“You think you know me now?”
