NATALIA
By the time Damon and I got back to my room, I was shivering—less from the chill in the air, more from everything that had unraveled over the past twenty-four hours. I sat down on the edge of the bed, towel still looped around my shoulders, and tried to process it all.
The confrontation. The fall. The rescue.
Andrei.
Alive in front of me again. Real. Demanding. Unchanged.
I’d spent years convincing myself that I could bury the past in silence, that motherhood and duty would erase the ache he left behind. That I’d moved on.
But then he said my name like a wound. Like he’d never stopped bleeding from it.
Damon was pacing the small room, hands folded behind his back, his expression unreadable. But I could tell he was holding himself back.
“So,” he said finally, his voice calm
