Ruby’s POV
I couldn’t stop thinking about the way his hands had moved.
Not just the training,though that had burned its own memory into my muscles,but the way he touched me after. Like I wasn’t just someone to protect, but someone to want. Someone to stay for. Someone real.
I should’ve felt overwhelmed. It had been too fast. Too much. Too close.
But I didn’t.
Instead, I felt alive.
There was something about the way Carter looked at me,like I wasn’t a collection of broken parts but a woman becoming whole again. The way he touched me, slow and reverent, like he knew exactly where the cracks were and wasn’t afraid of them.
And I let him.
I let him see the parts of me I’d buried under bruises and silence and fear. I let him touch the version of me that had almost disappeared beneath Ja
