Lucifer's verdant eyes met mine across the hall, a moment of silent acknowledgment before I looked away like a man who'd accidentally made eye contact with a public mirror and regretted seeing himself. His subtle nod carried a warning I didn't need—we both recognized the danger in the room, though perhaps for different reasons.
Not good.
These emotions again—nasty little things, creeping through the cracks of my carefully constructed composure like invasive vines through pavement. I didn't have time for this. I didn't have space for this. And yet, my brain kept superimposing Emma's face onto Alyssara's like some emotionally traumatic augmented reality filter I couldn't disable.
Emma. The girl who once painted color into my grayscale world.
Back in my previous life, she'd been everything—the gravity that kept me grounded, the compass that gave me direction. The one person who saw beyond my carefully constructed walls.
