Page 129 of Mystic's Sunrise

The room was familiar even though this was a different building. Same king sized bed. Same whiskey bottle on the nightstand. Same cold, dark wood furniture.

He turned to face me, and I barely had time to take a breath before he was on me, his hands roaming like he was trying toconvince himself I was real. His touch was rough, desperate, not cruel, but edged with something too close to it.

“Zeynep,” he breathed my name like a prayer and a curse all in one.

I tried not to recoil, but something in me shifted and he noticed. His face darkened.

“That bitch out there,” he growled, “she was just a hole I used to let off steam. She never meant shit.”

I swallowed, hard. “It doesn’t matter,” I said, and let him believe it hurt, relieved he thought that was the problem.

His jaw clenched so tight I heard it crack. “It matters tome.If you’d been where youbelong,I wouldn’t have had to use her.”

His grip didn’t tighten, but the threat was there, unspoken, simmering just below the surface.

“I’m here now,” I whispered, placing a hand on his chest. His heart pounded beneath my fingers, steady and brutal, whispering:Mine.

“That’s what matters. Right?”

His eyes locked on mine, nostrils flaring. “You fucking bet it does.”

He caught my wrist, yanked me closer, buried his face in my neck. His breath was ragged, like he’d been drowning and only just surfaced.

“I thought I lost you,” he said, voice cracked wide open. “You have no fucking idea what that did to me.”

He pulled back enough to stare into my face, searching for something I wasn’t sure how to fake anymore.

“But you’re back,” he said, tone flattening. “And you’ll never leave me again.”

He kissed my hand, not tender, but firm. Claiming. Branding.

“We belong together,” he said, softer now, but no less dangerous. “You’re my other half.”

I smiled. Forced. Careful. “I know.”

His fingers found my chin, tilted my face up. My pulse jumped, but I kept my breath even, my expression neutral.

He studied me like he wanted to see through the lie. And maybe he almost did. “I was furious when you left,” he said. “Furious that you didn’t trust me. That you left when I was trying to protect you.” He slid his thumb across my lip, slow and deliberate, and I let my breath stutter, just a little. “If you want me to forgive you…” he said, voice darkening, “then show me you’re still mine.”

The shiver that moved through me had nothing to do with want. This was the price to keep him from turning his fury on someone else. I let my lips part just enough. Let my lashes lower. Let my hands run down the front of his chest. Let him believe I was here for him, not because I was trying to survive. Because the truth would have to stay buried inside me.

If I ever got the chance again, I wouldn’t just run.

I’d disappear and I’d never look back.

CHAPTER SEVENTY-TWO

I KNEW SOMETHINGwas wrong the second I stepped through the door.Bone deep. Instant. That kind of wrong didn’t need an explanation, it just settled in the air.

I might’ve been running on fumes, muscles aching from days without real rest, but exhaustion couldn’t dull the instincts carved into me from war and blood and every fight I’d ever walked away from. Some things you don’t forget.

The air had changed. It was heavier now. Thick with silence, but not the quiet kind. This was the kind that came before something broke. The kind that warned you to brace yourself.

Chain and Devil stood near the bar, both of them still, like men waiting for a verdict. Their faces were grim, eyes guarded. Gearhead and Thunder leaned against the pool table, arms crossed tight over his chest, jaw clenched so hard I could see the muscle ticking in his temple. No drinks in their hands. No jokes in the air.

Not a sound in the whole damn place.

That’s when I knew.

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