Aria didn’t remember closing her eyes. One moment she was trembling, every bone vibrating from the aftershock of the explosion, and the next she was weightless—floating somewhere warm, somewhere quiet, somewhere that didn’t smell like smoke or fear.
When she blinked awake, the softness under her cheek wasn’t a pillow. It was a mattress that smelled faintly of cedar, gunpowder, and something sharper—Damian’s scent. Her fingers curled into the sheets before her mind could catch up.
A room came into focus.
Damian’s room.
Damian’s bed.
Damian’s silence.
Her heart stumbled.
Across from her, Damian Wolfe sat in a black chair pulled right to the edge of the mattress. His injured shoulder was wrapped in white gauze, blood blooming through the bandage in angry red. His chest was bare, rising and falling too slowly, too deliberately, as if each breath had to be negotiated with pain.
But his eyes—his eyes never moved from her.
He watched her like a starving man watches the last piece of bread before winter. Not angry. Not cold. Not calculating.
Lost.
Aria swallowed, throat tight. “Damian…?”
His jaw flexed, a small movement, but on him it looked like a crack in concrete. “Sleep.”
She blinked. “…I just woke up.”
“I noticed.” His voice was low, rough, shredded at the edges. “Close your eyes.”
She pushed herself up slowly, wincing as her body protested. “You shouldn’t even be sitting. Your shoulder—”
“Is fine.”
“It’s bleeding.”
“I said it’s fine.”
Her gaze dropped to his shaking hand resting on his thigh. Bruised knuckles. Torn skin. A tremor he couldn’t hide.
“Damian…” Her voice softened. “You need to lie down, too.”
He looked away for the first time since she opened her eyes. “I don’t.”
“You do.”
“I can’t.”
There was something in those two words—something raw enough to stop her breath. Aria shifted closer on the mattress, the blanket slipping from her shoulders.
“Why can’t you?” she whispered.
A long moment passed. Too long. The storm behind his eyes shook loose, but he held it back with iron will.
Finally, he exhaled.
“Because if I close my eyes,” Damian said quietly, “I’ll see that stairwell again. I’ll see you underneath it. I’ll see you not breathing. And my body…” His voice broke, barely audible. “My body isn’t built to survive that picture a second time.”
Her throat tightened painfully.
He wasn’t lying.
For once in his life, Damian Wolfe wasn’t hiding behind rage, commands, or cruelty. He wasn’t locking her away or punishing her. He wasn’t shielding emotion with violence.
He was shaking.
“Damian…” Aria whispered, softer this time.
He still wouldn’t look at her.
“I didn’t know you cared that much.”
Now he did look at her. And the intensity in his gaze nearly knocked the breath from her lungs.
“I told you,” he said, voice dangerously low, “I hear your voice above gunfire.”
She flushed.
He wasn’t done.
“I hear it even when you whisper. Even when you breathe wrong.” His jaw clenched. “Even when you’re not in the room.”
Aria felt something unravel and tighten at the same time. She reached for his hand before she could stop herself—just a brush, a hesitant touch. Damian flinched like she’d pressed a knife to his skin.
But he didn’t pull away.
His breath hitched, and he looked down at their hands touching—barely—like it was the most forbidden thing he’d ever allowed.
“You should sleep,” she whispered.
“I told you,” he murmured, “I’m not closing my eyes.”
“So don’t lie down,” she said softly. “Just… sit here. With me.”
He inhaled sharply.
Then nodded.
Aria shifted under the blanket and turned onto her side, facing him. Damian adjusted slightly in the chair—just enough for their knees to brush. Her heartbeat stuttered. His breathing changed.
He didn’t look away again.
Minutes slipped by, slow and fragile. Aria’s eyelids grew heavy, but she forced them open each time. Not because she was afraid—though she still was, in a strange, twisted way.
But because Damian was staring at her with a look she’d never seen. A look she didn’t know he had inside him.
A look that felt like a secret.
“Damian,” she murmured, “you’re hurt.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t the medic treat you first?”
“Because you were closer to the blast.”
“And you threw yourself over me.”
“Obviously.”
“Why?”
He should have snapped at her. He should have snarled. He should have shut down and rebuilt his walls.
But he didn’t.
He leaned forward until his forehead nearly touched hers. His uninjured hand rose—hesitated—then cupped her cheek with painful gentleness.
“Because the thought of losing you,” he whispered, “makes me want to tear the world apart.”
Aria’s breath broke.
His thumb brushed the corner of her mouth, trembling.
“I don’t want this,” Damian said. “I don’t want you in my head. I don’t want you in my blood. I don’t want you under my skin.” He swallowed hard. “But I can’t get you out.”
Aria pressed her cheek into his palm, a slow surrender she couldn’t control.
“You don’t hate me,” she whispered.
Damian’s eyes flickered—torment, longing, denial, devotion—churning in a violent storm.
“I’m trying to,” he whispered back. “Every damn day.”
“Then why—why all of this?”
He leaned closer.
“Because hating you,” Damian said softly, “is easier than loving you.”
Her heart stopped.
She shook, just once, like the words cracked something open inside her.
Damian pulled his hand back abruptly, as if he’d gone too far, said too much. But Aria grabbed his wrist before it escaped her.
“Stay,” she whispered.
He froze. Muscles locked. Breath caught.
She tugged gently.
He obeyed.
Damian sat on the edge of the bed, closer now, close enough that her knees brushed his thigh. His eyes softened for a heartbeat—just a heartbeat—before he masked it with something darker, heavier.
“You should sleep,” he murmured.
“Only if you sleep too,” she said quietly.
He looked at her like she’d asked for the world.
Then he reached out, almost cautiously, and let his hand rest on her cheek again.
“I’ll stay awake,” he whispered. “To guard your dreams.”
Aria’s lashes fluttered. Her breathing slowed. The warmth of his touch lulled her into a fragile peace she hadn’t known in years.
She fell asleep with his palm against her face.
Damian stayed exactly where he was.
He didn’t close his eyes.
He didn’t move.
He didn’t breathe properly.
He just watched her sleep—watched her curls fan across the pillow, watched her lips part softly, watched her chest rise and fall.
And when his shoulder throbbed and blood seeped through the bandage again, Damian ignored it.
Because for the first time in his life, he was guarding something he didn’t want to lose.
When dawn finally touched the windows, Damian whispered into the quiet air:
“You’re going to destroy me.”
He didn’t realize Aria, half-asleep, heard him.
And for the first time, she didn’t feel afraid.
She felt chosen.