POV: Violet
The hospital hallway was too bright. Too white.
The fluorescent lights hummed overhead, buzzing in my skull like hornets. My mother had been wheeled back into ICU, alive but fragile, her heartbeat a thin thread holding her to me. I stood frozen outside the doors, my scrubs clinging to my damp skin, my chest hollow.
I should have felt relief. Gratitude. Something.
But all I felt was fractured.
Ryan was on my left, his dark eyes fixed on me, fire barely caged beneath his skin. John stood on my right, shoulders square, jaw tight, his steady presence pressing against my ribs like a second heartbeat.
Storm. Anchor.
Two halves of me.
“Violet,” Ryan’s voice cut through the static. Low. Raw. “Come with me. Just for a minute. Please.”
My pulse jumped. He didn’t ask often. He co
