JEREMIAH STRETCHED out a hand across the mattress.
Cold sheets.
Empty space.
His chest tightened instantly.
Lily didn’t leave beds quietly. She moved like a sigh, soft but present, and always shifting the blankets or brushing against him. The fact that he hadn’t felt her slip away sparked an old instinct—one forged in years of violence, backstabbing alliances, and sudden danger.
Jeremiah pushed up on his elbows.
She sat on the couch across the room, wrapped in one of his shirts, her bare legs folded beneath her. The morning light caught the strands of her dark hair and the faint tremble in her hands as she studied the half-burnt map.
His heart sank.
“Lil,” he rasped, voice rough with sleep, “you okay?”
She didn’t look up. “I didn’t sleep much.”
He rose from the bed, tugged on his
