Sindy
I didn’t sleep.
I watched the fire die in the hearth, the embers pulsing like the heartbeat of something that refused to end. The walls seemed to breathe with me—slow, heavy, restless. And beneath it all, under my skin, the bond hummed, patient and merciless.
His last words kept echoing.
I feel you.
I hated that he did.
I hated more that it was true.
When dawn finally crept through the curtains, gray and thin, I rose from the bed, feeling as though I’d fought a war in my sleep. My body ached; my mind buzzed. I splashed cold water on my face, trying to chase the exhaustion away.
But cold couldn’t chase him.
Even the air smelled faintly of him—cedar, smoke, something sharp and wild that clung to the fabric of my thoughts.
I tried to brush it away, to remind myself I was stron
