The door closed behind him with a quiet finality.
Kael didn’t move.
For a long moment, he just stood there.
In the center of his chambers.
Still.
Silent.
But his mind wasn’t.
Her.
The memory wasn’t distant.
It wasn’t fading.
It was immediate.
Sharp.
The way she had looked at him
not afraid.
Not uncertain.
The way she hadn’t pulled away.
Kael exhaled slowly, dragging a hand down his face.
That should not have happened.
He had crossed a line he had kept intact for years.
Not out of discipline alone
but because control had always been enough.
Until now.
He moved toward his desk but didn’t sit.
Didn’t touch anything.
Didn’t focus.
Because every time he tried
his mind returned to the same moment.
The pause before the kiss.
The way her breath had shifted.
The way his
