The following morning, sunlight filtered through the cabin’s large windows, casting golden streaks across the wooden floor. I stretched in bed, the warmth of the morning light wrapping around me like a soft blanket. For the first time in what felt like forever, I woke up without a sense of dread curling in my chest. The stillness of the forest outside wasn’t suffocating—it was freeing.
But even in this peace, the memory of last night’s visit lingered.
Jace and Nolan.
Their presence had unsettled me, but not in the way I’d expected. It wasn’t fear, exactly, but a kind of restless curiosity. There was something about them—the intensity in their eyes, the way they seemed to see right through me. And Nolan’s piercing blue eyes, in particular, haunted my thoughts. I could still see the way t
