ISABELLA
A week had passed since I was discharged from the hospital, and the world still felt slightly off-kilter. My body was healing, but my mind… my mind was trying to catch up. Today was my follow‑up appointment. Tobias drove, as always, but something was different. The moment I stepped outside, I noticed it—the number of men around us had doubled. They weren’t obvious about it; they blended into cars, sidewalks, corners. But I’d lived long enough in Adrian’s world to recognize a security shift.
“Tobias,” I said quietly as we walked toward the car, “is it just me, or are there more of you today?”
He didn’t look at me, didn’t break stride. “Just precaution, Isabella.”
Precaution.
That word had become a blanket explanation for everything lately. I settled into the back seat, watchin
