The room held a calm separate from the residence's growing strain, a quiet haven ringed by stone walls that blocked the worst of the outside storm for now, though truth would breach it in time, no barrier strong enough to hold it back forever.
Kade stood long by the bed, his Amber molten eyes fixed on Dakota's still form. Her breaths moved steadily and deep, the kind of sleep where the body surrenders itself wholly to repair, yielding what the poison had taken hour by hour. Her face carried a peace so complete it pressed against his chest like a slow, settling weight.
Hours before, the house had edged toward chaos. Her hands had shifted to claws. Her eyes had burned with something wild and lost. The wolf had worn destruction like a second skin.
Now she rested, lashes dark against pale skin, lips parted soft, giving him a trust so unguarded it cut deeper than any wound he had known how to name.
