Amara sat by her window, the moon spilling pale silver light across her face. She tried to read, to distract herself, but her eyes kept drifting to the shadows. Each night had been the same, sleep evaded her. Her mind replayed the days she spent in captivity with Sera, the helplessness that clawed at her, and then shifted toward the present, the search, the missions, Damien.
Her chest tightened at the thought of him. Damien. Ruthless to the world, yet fragile when it came to his daughter. A man feared by enemies, yet one who had allowed her to see him in his rawest, most human moments. That night when he had broken down in her arms, she had realized how deep his pain ran.
And now, after weeks of proximity, of sparks they never spoke of but both felt, she couldn’t deny what was happening
