Emily Rosewood's Point Of View.
The wind up here had been vicious, but I did not feel it.
I sat on the warm hood of Adrian’s old black pickup, boots dangling over the edge, knees drawn up under the thick wool blanket. I wore two layers of them: Sebastian’s soft black flannel that still carried the scent of cedar and gun-smoke, and Adrian’s battered leather jacket that still held the faint trace of the fire from the night the ballroom fell. The sleeves swallowed my hands; the flannel hem brushed mid-thigh. They had argued for ten full minutes about whose scent would calm me more. I had solved it by stealing both.
From this ridge I could see the entire valley: the dark, breathing mass of the Forgotten Woods to the south, the silver ribbon of the river that cut through pack lands, and far,
