I woke up alone.
Kael's side of the bed was cold. The sheets still smelled like him — pine, leather, the faint metallic tang of gun oil that never quite washed out. My body ached in places I hadn't known could ache. My throat. My hips. The inside of my thighs where his stubble had burned tracks into my skin.
I lay there for a minute. Two. Listening to the compound waking up around me — boots on floorboards, the rumble of Tank's voice somewhere distant, coffee brewing in the kitchen.
The lamp was still on. Kael had wanted me to see everything.
I pulled on his shirt — the black one with the sleeves cut off, the one that smelled strongest of him — and walked barefoot down the hall to my room.
I needed clean clothes. A shower. Coffee. In that order.
I opened my door.
And stopped.
On my
