They’d barely touched him. A few bruises, the cuts from the cords, the discomfort of thirst and hunger. Nothing compared to what they had done to her.

  And he had left her alone with it. Had refused her when she’d reached out to him in her suffering.

  “Shadera,” he whispered, the word breaking in his throat.

  Her good eye flickered at the sound of his voice, focusing on him for a brief moment before sliding away. The deliberate avoidance sent a spike of pain through his chest, sharpening by the second.

  “She needs water,” Mikel said, his voice neutral but something unreadable flowing beneath the current. “Both of you do.”

  He snapped his fingers, and another officer appeared with two bottles of water. Mikel took them, dismissing the officer with a nod, then handed one to Greyson. He approached Shadera carefully, as one might a wounded animal, and held the bottle to her swollen lips.

  “Drink,” he said, his tone softer than before.

  Shadera’s throat worked convulsively as she gulped the water, some of it spilling down her chin and onto her ruined shirt. Greyson watched, his own thirst momentarily forgotten as he witnessed her desperation. When Mikel finally pulled the bottle away, nearly empty, Shadera sagged further between the officers supporting her.

  Greyson raised his own bottle to his lips, the cool water a shock to his system after so long without. He drank greedily, some distant part of his mind warning him to slow down, that too much too quickly would make him sick. But his body’s demands overrode caution and he drained the bottle in seconds.

  “We need to go,” Mikel said, checking his watch. “The Vow begins soon.”

  Greyson’s rage surged again at the mention of the ceremony. He wanted to lash out, to smash his fist into Mikel’s face, into the faces of every Veyra officer who’d watched Shadera be brutalized. But he couldn’t. Not when she was in this state, not when the threat of the rings’ destruction hung over them.

  “Can you walk?” Mikel asked him.

  Greyson nodded once, sharply. His legs were unsteady, but functioning. More than could be said for Shadera, who remained suspended between her guards, head hanging forward.

  “Then let’s go.”

  Greyson fixed his gaze on Shadera’s back as they left the private prison, watching for any sign that she might collapse entirely. Each step she managed, however halting, however supported by the officers, was a testament to a strength he couldn’t begin to comprehend.

  They emerged into his father’s residence, the opulence of it an obscene contrast to the cells they’d left behind. Thick carpets, elegant furniture, art that cost more than most Boundary residents would see in a lifetime.

  It felt like an eternity before they made it to the elevator, before they made it to his floor. Mikel slid a key card into the locks that were unfamiliar to Greyson, new, high tech. He stepped in first and held the door open for his men.

  The officers deposited Shadera onto the sofa, her body folding into it like a discarded doll. Greyson stood in the center of the room, unsure where to go, what to do, how to help her.

  Mikel scanned the apartment before turning to Greyson, but said nothing.

  Silence stretched between them, uncomfortable and heavy.

  “Is there anything I can do for you?” Greyson finally asked, the words sounding strange to his own ears—formal, distant, nothing like the screaming rage inside him.

  Mikel studied him for a long moment, then turned to the officers. “Wait in the hallway,” he ordered.

  The officers filed out, leaving the door open at Mikel’s back. Still, he remained, standing straight, hands clasped behind his back in military precision.

  Finally, Mikel cleared his throat as if snapping himself from some trance. “I’ll be outside if you need anything,” he said, his voice low. “I will step back inside at noon to collect you.”

  He said nothing else as he turned to the door, closing it behind him with a finality that echoed in the quiet apartment.

  Greyson stood motionless, staring at the closed door, feeling the seconds tick away toward the inevitable. Then he turned to Shadera.

  * * *

  SHAME BURNED HOTTER THAN pain as Shadera forced her battered body to move. Every cell screamed in protest, every breath a fresh agony as broken ribs shifted beneath her skin. But she couldn’t stay here, couldn’t bear the weight of Greyson’s gaze on her ruined form a moment longer. She had to hide. Had to get away from those eyes that held so much pity. She would rather endure another beating than see that look on his face again.

  She pushed herself up from the sofa, swallowing the cry that rose in her throat. Her vision swam, darkness encroaching at the edges as blood rushed from her head. One step. Then another. Her legs trembled beneath her, threatening to fold with each movement. The bedroom door seemed miles away, an impossible distance across the luxury apartment that mocked her broken state with its pristine surfaces and soft furnishings.

  Don’t look at him. Don’t let him see what they’ve made of you.

  Greyson took a step toward her, his arms reaching for her, preparing to help. She took a step away from him and his body froze mid-motion, his fingers curling into fists as he brought his arms back to his body.

  She dragged herself forward, one arm wrapped protectively around her shattered ribs. She could feel Greyson’s eyes on her back, burning into her, but she didn’t turn. Couldn’t face the judgment, the disgust, the hatred that would be written there.

  The bedroom door gave way under her touch, swinging open to reveal the only place she suddenly felt safe. Her gaze fixed on the bathroom door across the room. Just a little further. Just a few more steps and she could collapse in private, could let the tears come without an audience to witness her final humiliation.

  Her foot caught on the bed’s edge, sending her stumbling. Pain exploded through her chest as her broken ribs protested the sudden movement. Still, she bit back the scream, refused to give voice to her weakness.

  She made it to the bathroom, her hand closing around the doorknob as if it were a lifeline reaching out to her. She put her weight onto it as she dragged herself the last few steps into the room. The door swung closed as she let go of the knob and grabbed on the towel rack.

  Only then did she allow herself to sag against the cool wall, legs finally surrendering to gravity. She slid down slowly, each inch a fresh torment, until she sat crumpled on the floor, knees drawn up as far as her battered body would allow, trying to catch her breath.

  The marble tiles were cold against her skin, a small mercy in the inferno of pain that was her existence. She stared at her reflection in the glass shower door—a stranger looked back at her. A creature of bruises and blood, one eye swollen shut, the other haunted and hollow. Her face was misshapen, cheekbone possibly fractured, jaw bruised and tender. Her hair hung in matted strands, stiff with dried blood.

  This was what remained of Shadera Kael, the Daggermouth. This broken thing on the bathroom floor.

  She pushed herself toward the bath, reaching up to turn the faucets with hands that shook violently. Water thundered into the tub, steam rising to fog the mirrors, to blur her reflection into something less monstrous. The sound would mask her tears, her weakness, would hide from Greyson the final dissolution of whatever strength he might have thought she possessed.

  Tears came then, hot and stinging as they tracked down her battered face, mixing with fresh blood where they found cuts not yet closed. Her shoulders shook with silent sobs that sent waves of agony through her chest, but she couldn’t stop them now. Everything she’d held in during the beatings, during the endless hours in that cell—it all poured out of her in a flood she had no power to contain.

  The water continued to rain down, its roar almost loud enough to drown out the sound of her own shuddering breaths. Almost, but not quite. She needed to get in, to wash away the blood and filth, to feel clean again, if only for a moment. But the thought of removing her clothes, of seeing the full extent of what they’d done to her body, made her stomach heave.

  Still, she had to try. Had to at least attempt this tiny reclamation of dignity before they forced her onto that platform to play her part in Maximus’s twisted ceremony.

  Her hands found the counter’s ledge, using every last ounce of her strength to pull herself upward.

  She gripped the hem of her torn shirt, steeling herself for what was to come. Then, with a quick breath that sent knives between her ribs, she tried to lift it over her head.

  The pain was immediate and overwhelming. White-hot agony ripped through her torso as her arms raised, pulling at muscles that had been pulverized, at skin that had been split open and should’ve been stitched back together. A scream tore from her throat before she could stop it, primal and raw, echoing off the tiled walls.

  Her vision tunneled, darkness rushing in as her legs gave way beneath her. She was falling, dimly aware that her body was about to hit the unforgiving bathroom floor, that the impact would be one agony too many. But the blow never came.

  Arms caught her, breaking her fall, cradling her against a solid chest. She felt herself being lowered gently to the floor, heard her name being called from what seemed like a great distance.

  “Shadera. Shadera, look at me.”

  Greyson’s voice, urgent and tight with an emotion that didn’t sound like disgust, that didn’t sound like hate. His hand cupped her face, thumb brushing across her injured cheek with impossible gentleness.

  The contact broke something in her—some final wall that had been holding back the tide of her grief and shame and despair. A sob ripped from her chest, then another, until she was crying openly, ugly sounds tearing from her throat as she curled into herself.

  “I’m sorry,” she gasped between sobs, the words falling from her lips in a desperate litany. “I’m so sorry. For everything. For Brooker. For not knowing. You were right. I am a murderer. I am a monster.”

  Her good eye sought his face through the blur of tears, searching for some hint of forgiveness, of understanding, but it refused to focus.

  His arms tightened around her, drawing her closer, one hand cradling the back of her head. He held her as she cried, her tears soaking into his shirt, her body shaking against his. He made no attempt to shush her or stem the flow of her grief. He simply held her, solid and present, an anchor in the storm of her despair.

  She didn’t know how long they stayed that way—her broken and weeping, him silent and steadfast. Time seemed to lose meaning, stretching and contracting with each shuddering breath. The bathwater continued to run, filling the tub to its brim before the automatic overflow kicked in, maintaining the water level with a gentle gurgling sound.

  Eventually, her sobs quieted, exhaustion claiming what remained of her strength. She sagged against him, drained and empty.

  Still, Greyson said nothing. The silence between them had changed, though—no longer charged with anger and betrayal, but something almost like acceptance.

  Finally, he shifted, his arms adjusting their hold on her but not letting go.

  “I’m going to help you,” he said, his voice low and rough, as if the words were being dragged from somewhere deep inside him. “Let me help you into the bath. Let me help you get out of these clothes.”

  It wasn’t forgiveness—not yet. It was a man showing that he still had a heart, that despite his own pain the good man she’d come to know still remained.

  * * *

  GREYSON’S HANDS TREMBLED AS he reached for the scissors in the bathroom cabinet. Not from weakness—though his body still ached from captivity—but from the storm of emotions that raged beneath his skin.

  Anger at his father, at the men who had done this to her. Guilt that twisted like a knife in his gut for how he’d treated her, for the words he’d spoken in cold fury. And something else, something that terrified him more than either of these—a desperate tenderness that threatened to shatter what remained of his carefully constructed walls.

  She sat with her back facing him, small and broken, a shadow of the woman he’d first encountered, and every instinct in his body screamed to protect her, to heal her, to never let her be hurt again.

  He sunk back to his knees, scissors in hand, her ruined clothes stuck to her body with dried blood and sweat. Her breathing was shallow, carefully controlled to minimize the pain.

  “I’m going to cut these off,” he said, his voice gentler than he’d intended. “It’ll hurt less than trying to lift them over your head.”

  She nodded once, a small, tight movement that revealed how much pain even that simple action caused her. Greyson swallowed hard, pushing down the rage that threatened to consume him at the sight of her suffering. Rage wouldn’t help her now. She needed steady hands, calm words, careful touch.

  He began with her shirt, slipping the blade of the scissors under the hem and cutting upward in a slow, deliberate motion. The fabric parted easily, revealing inches of skin mottled with bruises—some fresh, some already beginning to heal. Blood pooled underneath her skin that threatened internal bleeding coming from somewhere in her abdomen. But it was what he saw beneath the injuries that forced the oxygen from his lungs.

  Scars. Dozens of them. Old and silvered with time, crisscrossing her body in a chaotic pattern that spoke of years of violence. A knife wound just below her ribs, puckered and raised. A burn that covered her left side, the skin mottled and uneven. Bullet wounds. So many bullet wounds.

  Her body was a battlefield, a record of survival written in scar tissue and damaged flesh.

  Greyson’s fingers stilled on the scissors, his throat tightening. These were the evidence of a life lived in brutality, of pain endured and overcome time and again. How had he never noticed? How had he been so blind to the story her body told?

  He’d seen some of the scars before, in that black, backless dress, but somehow, it hadn’t fully registered. Somehow this close, with nothing to cover her, he was forced to truly understand the violence that her body had seen.

  He wanted to run his fingers across their ridges, let his lips trace the outlines of the tattoos inked between them.

  “It’s nothing you haven’t seen before,” she murmured, her voice barely audible over the running water.

  She was wrong. She was so fucking wrong.

  He had never seen anything so heartbreaking, so beautiful and horrifying at once.

  He continued cutting, removing her shirt piece by careful piece to avoid disturbing her injuries. The fabric had adhered to some of her wounds, and he had to wet it with a washcloth to prevent reopening them as he worked. She remained still throughout, only the occasional sharp intake of breath betraying the agony each movement caused her.

  When her torso was completely bare, Greyson had to clench his jaw to keep from cursing aloud. The unnatural depression on her left side confirmed what he’d suspected—at least two breaks, possibly more. Precise injury, designed to cause maximum pain without endangering vital organs. His father’s men knew exactly what they were doing. How to hurt without killing. How to break without destroying.

  He moved to her pants next, cutting from ankle to waist in two long lines that allowed the fabric to fall away without her having to stand. More bruises revealed themselves, more tattoos, more scars—a particularly vicious one that ran the length of her thigh, another that curved around her knee. The story of her life continuing down her legs, a narrative of pain and survival that made his own scars feel insignificant in comparison.

  When he’d finished, she sat before him naked and shivering. Despite her injuries, despite the vulnerability of her position, she met his eyes and held his gaze with a dignity that made his chest ache. This was Shadera—the real Shadera, stripped of masks and defenses, of bravado and pride. This was the woman who’d survived horrors he could only imagine, who’d been shaped by pain as he’d been, forged in the same cruel fire that had tempered his own soul.

  They were mirror images, he realized. Both weapons crafted by others’ hands, both scarred by the roles they’d been forced to play. Both longing for something they could barely name—freedom, perhaps. Redemption. A chance to be more than what violence had made them.

  “The water’s getting cold,” he said, the words inadequate against the magnitude of what he felt.

  Shadera nodded, still watching him with that single, wary eye. She tried to stand, her legs trembling with the effort, and Greyson moved without hesitating, sliding one arm beneath her knees, the other supporting her back, lifting her with a care he hadn’t known he possessed.

  Her body felt fragile against his chest despite the strength he knew it contained. He could feel her heartbeat, rapid and shallow, her skin cool beneath his touch. He lowered her gently into the water, supporting her head as she hissed at the initial contact with her injuries. Steam rose around them, fogging the mirrors, creating a world that existed only in this moment, separate from the horrors that awaited beyond the bathroom door.

  For a few precious minutes, there was no Vow ceremony, no Heart, no Boundary. Just two broken people finding a moment of peace in the midst of chaos.

  “Is it too hot?” he asked, hands still wrapped around her as if he were scared to let her go.

  She shook her head slightly, eyes closing as the warmth began to ease some of the tension from her battered body. “It’s perfect,” she whispered.

  Greyson remained kneeling beside the tub, watching as the water turned pink with diluted blood, as her face softened slightly with the first real relief she’d experienced in days. Something twisted in his chest at the sight—something that felt dangerously close to forgiveness.

  His brother’s ghost seemed to hover in the steam filled room, a presence impossible to ignore. Shadera had killed him—unknowingly, yes, but the fact remained. His blood was on her hands. Greyson should hate her for that. Should want nothing to do with her. Should walk away and leave her to face whatever fate awaited them both.