POV: Violet
The elevator hummed around us, a box of steel and shadows. The faint flicker of the emergency light above painted Ryan’s face in gold and shadow, and I hated how beautiful he looked even when he was carved from tension.
My pulse hammered so loud I swore he could hear it.
Then I remembered—he could.
Wolf.
That truth still felt surreal, like something out of the fever dreams I used to have as a kid. But standing here with him, it wasn’t fantasy. His storm-dark eyes weren’t human eyes. His stillness wasn’t human stillness. And when he tilted his head, every line of his body tuned toward me, I knew—he was listening to more than my voice.
He was listening to my heartbeat.
“You’re scared,” he said softly, voice rough like gravel.
I bristled. “Of being trapped in here with you
