The training room at dawn is a cathedral of shadows and violence.

I'm alone—or I was, until the door opens and cedarwood floods in like smoke. My entire nervous system goes on alert before my brain even registers that it's him.

Kael.

Of course it's Kael.

He's shirtless, wearing only black training pants that hang low on his hips, and the sight of him hits me like a physical blow. Broad shoulders. Defined chest. The kind of body that comes from centuries of being an apex predator, not from vanity. His dark hair is pulled back, revealing the sharp architecture of his face, and those obsidian eyes find me across the empty room like he's been looking for me everywhere.

Which, given last night in the garden, he probably has.

"Sienna," he says. Just my name. No question. No apology. Just a statement of fact—I exist, and he's found me.

I'm standing in the center of the mat, wrapped in loose training clothes, my hands still wrapped from the heavy bag work I've been doing for the past three hours. The sun hasn't fully risen yet. The compound sleeps. This is the only time I can think without feeling like I'm drowning.

Apparently, Kael had other ideas.

"This is a bad idea," I say, but I'm already unwrapping my hands.

"Probably." He steps onto the mat, and the air between us crackles like a live wire. "Rowan told you how he felt."

Not a question.

"He did."

"And?"

I pull the last of the wrap free, drop it on the floor. "And nothing. We're not doing this right now, Kael."

"Doing what?" He moves closer, slow and deliberate, like he's approaching something dangerous. Something that might bolt. "Talking about the fact that you've been avoiding me since yesterday? Or the fact that you kissed me back in that garden like you were starving?"

Heat floods my chest. My jaw clenches.

"I don't do feelings," I say flatly. "You know this about me. I don't do complicated. I don't do—"

"Vulnerable?" He's closer now, maybe ten feet away. Close enough that I can smell him—that intoxicating cedarwood and smoke that makes my hindbrain scream for things I can't afford to want. "You did yesterday."

"Yesterday was a mistake."

The lie tastes like ash.

He doesn't argue. Instead, he drops into a fighting stance, and something in my chest cracks open like an egg.

"Then prove it," he says softly. "Fight me."

---

The first punch I throw is pure fury.

It's fast, vicious, aimed at his face with every ounce of strength I have. Kael blocks it easily, but I'm already moving—spinning, following up with a roundhouse kick that he ducks under, and then we're dancing that ancient dance that predators know in their bones. Attack, defend, counter. Again. Again.

My body moves on instinct while my mind screams.

This is stupid. This is dangerous. This is exactly what I can't afford.

But his hands on my arms as he blocks my strike are firm and warm, and when our bodies collide, I remember what it felt like to be held by something strong enough that I didn't have to be.

I push the thought away and drive my elbow back toward his ribs.

He catches it, spins me around, and suddenly I'm against his chest, his arms locked around me, and we're both breathing hard. My heart is hammering against my ribs like it's trying to escape.

"Still a mistake?" His voice is low, rough, right against my ear.

I drive my heel backward toward his instep, and he releases me with a low laugh. The sound is dangerous and hungry and makes my skin prickle with awareness.

We separate, reset. The dance continues.

This time when he comes at me, there's less control in it. More need. His strikes are faster, harder, and I match him blow for blow because I'm terrified if I stop moving, I'll have to feel how badly I want this. How badly I want him.

His fist comes toward my head, and I slip it, grab his wrist, use his momentum to pull him forward and down. He rolls with it, comes up behind me, and his arms wrap around my waist. For a moment, we're suspended in that space between fighting and something else entirely.

"You're thinking too much," he murmurs against my neck.

"You're not thinking enough," I snap back, but I don't pull away.

He spins me to face him, and his eyes are dark with something that makes my breath catch. His hands are on my shoulders, and I can feel the heat of him radiating out like a furnace.

"Stop running," he says.

"Stop chasing," I counter.

But neither of us moves.

The next exchange is different. It's less about technique and more about proximity—about testing the limits of what we can do without crossing a line that I'm not sure I can come back from. His hands on my body are careful, controlled, but there's a tremor in them that mirrors the one in my own limbs.

I catch his arm in a lock, pull him closer, and our foreheads nearly touch. For a moment, we're breathing the same air, separated by inches and the last shreds of my self-preservation.

"Sienna—" he starts.

I throw him over my shoulder.

He lands hard on his back, the air knocked from his lungs with a grunt, and I stand over him, trying to catch my breath. Trying to remember why this is a terrible idea.

He's looking up at me with those dark eyes, and there's blood on his lip from where his teeth cut the inside of his mouth during the fall. His chest is heaving. His hands are clenched at his sides like he's holding himself back by sheer force of will.

And then he sits up, and I see it.

The scar.

It starts at his left shoulder and runs diagonally across his entire chest, ending just above his heart. It's massive—thick and pale and clearly old, the kind of scar that comes from a wound so severe it should have killed him. The kind of scar that tells a story of survival and agony and something so profound it changed him fundamentally.

I forget to breathe.

"Kael," I whisper.

He doesn't move. Doesn't try to hide it. Just sits there, shirtless and bleeding and exposed in a way that has nothing to do with his physical body.

"Her name was Elara," he says quietly. "She was pack. Young. Talented. She was going to be extraordinary." He touches the scar absently, running his fingers along it like he's reading Braille. "There was a territorial dispute. Raiders from the northern clans. I was handling it, thought I had it under control, but I was wrong."

My throat is tight. I can't move.

"She tried to protect me," he continues. "Shifted, threw herself between me and a blade. I should have been faster. Should have seen it coming. Should have—" His voice cracks, and something in my chest shatters along with it. "She died in my arms, and I couldn't save her."

I sink down onto the mat in front of him, and without thinking about it—without letting my fear stop me—I reach out and touch the scar.

My fingertips trace the raised tissue, and Kael goes absolutely still.

"It wasn't your fault," I say.

"Wasn't it?" His laugh is bitter. "I'm the alpha. It's my job to protect my people. I failed."

"You're human," I say, and the irony of that statement isn't lost on either of us. "You can't save everyone."

"I should have saved her."

I look up at him, and his eyes are wet, and something that's been locked inside me for years suddenly demands to be acknowledged. This beautiful, terrible man with his crown of blood and his impossible standards is just as broken as I am. Just as haunted. Just as desperate to matter enough that the losses don't destroy him.

"I know," I whisper.

And then I'm kissing him.

It's not gentle. It's not careful. It's months of restraint and denial and the kind of need that comes from surviving things you shouldn't have survived. My hands are in his hair, pulling him closer, and his arms come around me like he's afraid I'll disappear if he doesn't hold on hard enough.

He tastes like blood and desperation and that intoxicating cedarwood smoke, and I'm drowning in it. My body is pressed against his, and every place we touch is electric and burning and right in a way that terrifies me.

His hands slide down my back, pulling me closer, and a low sound comes from his chest—something between a growl and a groan that sends heat spiraling through my core.

"Sienna," he breathes against my mouth. "Tell me you want this."

"I can't," I gasp, but I'm kissing him again, harder, deeper, like I can consume him and make this less terrifying if I just hold on tight enough.

He pulls back just far enough to look at me, and his eyes are dark and desperate and full of something that looks like love, and that's when the panic hits.

This is too much. This is too real. This is the kind of thing that destroys you because once you let someone in, once you let them matter, they become a target. They become something you can lose.

And I've already lost everything.

I push away from him, scrambling backward, my breath coming in short, sharp gasps.

"No," I say. "No, I can't—Kael, I can't do this."

He's breathing hard, his chest heaving, and there's a rawness in his expression that makes my chest ache. "Why not?"

"Because I'm going to hurt you," I say, and it comes out broken. "Because I'm broken, and I don't know how to not destroy everything I touch, and because if I let you matter, if I let myself want this, then I'm just giving the universe permission to take it away."

"That's not how it works," he says quietly.

"Isn't it?" I stand up, putting distance between us. "My entire family was murdered, Kael. Everyone I loved was slaughtered like animals. And you know what I learned from that? That love is a luxury I can't afford. That the only way to survive is to not let anyone close enough to hurt you."

He stands, and the scar on his chest is like an accusation, a reminder of all the ways he's already tried to save someone and failed.

"So what?" he asks. "We just pretend this didn't happen? You go back to being untouchable, and I go back to pretending I don't think about you every moment of every day?"

"Yes," I say, but the word is a lie, and we both know it.

"No." He steps toward me, and I step back. "I'm not doing this, Sienna. I'm not letting you run. Not this time."

"You don't have a choice," I say, and my voice is cold now, defended, the armor slamming back into place. "This was a mistake. A moment of weakness. It won't happen again."

The pain that flashes across his face is worse than any blade.

"You're lying," he says softly. "To me or to yourself, I'm not sure which. But you're lying."

I turn and walk toward the door, and every step feels like I'm tearing myself apart from the inside out.

"Sienna, wait—"

I don't stop. I can't. Because if I do, if I turn around and look at him one more time, I'll break. I'll go back. I'll let myself believe that maybe, just maybe, I could be the kind of person who gets to have something good.

And I know better.

I know what happens to people who let their guard down.

I know what happens when you let yourself love something in a world designed to destroy it.

I've lived through that nightmare already.

I won't survive it twice.

---

The hallway is empty and cold, and my hands are shaking as I walk back to my room. My lips still taste like him. My skin still remembers the feel of his hands. My heart is still racing like it's trying to escape my chest.

And in my mind, I can see that scar—that massive, terrible scar that marks the place where he failed to save someone he loved.

A scar that looks a lot like mine, just in a different location.

Just as deep.

Just as permanent.

Behind me, I hear the training room door slam open, and his voice carries down the hallway: "This isn't over, Sienna."

I don't turn around.

But my hands are shaking so badly I can barely make it to my room, and when I finally collapse on my bed, I bury my face in my pillow and let myself feel the weight of what I just walked away from.

The worst part?

I'm not sure I have the strength to keep walking away.