Cruz:
I wasn’t supposed to be here.
Not in this bed, wrapped in cotton sheets that still smelled like her shampoo. Not with her breath steady and warm on my chest. Not with her arms draped over me like I was something she wanted to keep.
But here I was.
Alive.
Barely.
The pain had dulled to a throbbing hum, a background noise behind the heaviness of my body. I could feel every stitch she put in me. Every fevered tremor from the night before. But mostly, I felt her.
The weight of her against me. The quiet sigh she made in her sleep. The faint heartbeat that brushed my ribs like a promise.
It wrecked me.
Because I’d tried so damn hard not to need this.
Not to need her.
I stared up at the ceiling as the first gray light of dawn bled into the room. It was soft. Too soft for someone
