Elena barely slept.
Every time she closed her eyes, she saw Dante collapsing against her, burning with fever. She saw the blood spreading across his shirt, too dark, too thick, too wrong. And then there was the moment his eyes fluttered, gold flickering like trapped fire, before exhaustion dragged him under.
She’d managed to get him safe for the night, but nothing about him was fine.
Nothing about this silence was normal.
When the first light of dawn pushed through the window, Elena forced herself upright. The house was too quiet. The kind of quiet that makes a person’s heartbeat sound too loud inside their ears.
She grabbed her sweater, inhaling sharply as cold morning air brushed across her skin, and hurried down the hall.
Dante’s door was halfway open.
Her pulse kicked.
She push
