BLOOD IN SILK

The morning came cold.

The bed was warm, but empty when she opened her eyes.

Cassian was gone.

Alina sat up slowly, the sheets tangled around her legs. Her body still remembered him — his hands, his mouth, the way he'd touched her like she was something more than a pawn. But her heart…

Her heart felt heavier.

She wrapped the sheet around her and stared at the gray concrete walls. There were no windows in the room, no light but the pale glow leaking under the door.

And inside her, a war had begun.

She had let him in.

She had wanted it.

The realization hit her like a betrayal she had authored with her own hands.

Last night, she hadn't fought him. She hadn't run.

She had craved it.

What did that say about her?

What did that say about the girl who had once dreamed of exposing monsters, not kissing them?

Cassian returned moments later, quiet as ever, holding a mug of coffee. His shirt was rumpled, hair damp like he'd just come from washing blood off his soul.

He paused in the doorway when he saw her.

Their eyes met.

Something passed between them — but she looked away.

"I brought this," he said, voice rough, placing the mug on the bedside table.

She didn't take it.

Cassian stood there for a second too long, then turned to leave.

"Wait," Alina said, not sure why.

He turned slowly. "What?"

Her throat tightened. "Last night… that shouldn't have happened."

Cassian didn't flinch, but his jaw went stone.

"Is that regret in your voice, Little Flame?"

She winced at the name.

"You don't get to call me that anymore."

His expression didn't change, but something behind his eyes flickered.

"Fine," he said. "Then say what you really mean."

She stood, letting the sheet fall from her shoulders, unbothered by the way he looked at her now — not with lust, but something sharper.

"I think I forgot who I am for a minute," she said. "And you let me."

Cassian stepped closer. "You think I forced you?"

"No," she whispered. "I think I wanted it. And that scares me more."

He exhaled, harsh and low. "You're not the only one who forgot something last night."

She blinked.

He continued, voice lower. "You weren't just fire, Alina. You were peace. For a second, you made everything else go quiet."

Her eyes burned.

"I don't want to be your peace," she said. "I want to go back to who I was before all this."

Cassian looked at her, and for once, she saw the truth under all that stone.

"You can't," he said. "None of us go back."

She didn't answer. She just turned away.

And this time, he let her.

Across the city — in Washington D.C.

The room was quiet.

Senator Darrow sat behind his desk, staring at the screen with the kind of stillness that came before a storm.

Across from him, a suited man lowered his phone. "The footage is verified. She's alive. Somewhere in New York."

A still frame from security footage played again — grainy but unmistakable.

Alina. Alive. Slipping into a black car with tinted windows. Someone else was with her — tall, male, face mostly hidden. But the angle caught a flash of jawline, a scar above his eyebrow.

Senator Darrow stared.

"Who is he?" he asked.

"We're working on it. Facial recognition flagged something, but—"

"I don't want 'working on it.'" The senator's voice was ice. "I want him buried."

The agent nodded once.

Darrow leaned back, jaw tight. His daughter — the one who was supposed to be gone — had reemerged like a ghost. But it wasn't relief that filled him.

It was fury.

Because if she was alive, it meant she knew things. It meant she could talk.

And if she was with someone — it meant she might already be talking.

He pressed a button on his desk. "Get me a line to the Mazzetti family."

"But sir—"

"Now."

His smile was cold as steel.

"If my daughter wants to run with wolves," he said, "then she'll learn what it means to be hunted by them."

Back in the warehouse

Alina stood in the shower far too long, water running down her skin like it could rinse away the night. But nothing touched the ache under her ribs — the hollow space where something old had cracked.

When she stepped out, a phone sat on the edge of the sink.

Cassian had left it.

Unlocked.

A choice.

She picked it up with shaking hands.

The home screen held nothing personal. Just a missed call — from someone labeled Vale HQ — and a text below it:

"She's been spotted. Your time's running out."

Alina stared at the screen.

She's been spotted.

Her heart dropped.

She put the phone down slowly, her breath catching in her throat.

Her father knew.

She could feel it in her bones.

She walked back into the main room, towel wrapped around her, and found Cassian standing near the windowless wall, watching the shadows shift in silence.

He turned as she approached.

"We don't have much time," he said. "They've seen you."

Alina didn't answer.

Because in that moment, she understood what she truly regretted.

Not the kiss.

Not the night.

She regretted thinking she could feel something again — and survive it.