Page 56 of Beautiful Ruins
I expelled a breath, dragging a hand down my jaw as the weight of it settled in.
18
Izzy
Iwoke up like I’d been dropped from a height.
Everything hurt.
My limbs felt weighted, bruised from the inside out.My lip burned when I tried to move it.My head pulsed in slow, punishing waves, like someone had wedged a drum behind my eyes and was testing the rhythm.
For a moment, I didn’t move.
I just lay there, staring at the ceiling, trying to piece together where I was and why my body felt like it didn’t belong to me.
The mattress was softer than mine.
The air smelled faintly of clean linen and something darker beneath it—wood, smoke, something distinctly male.
Raze.
The memory hit in fragments.
The door slamming open.
The men.
The attack.
The threats.
We’ll be back.
Then him.The way he’d filled the doorway.The way he’d lifted me like I weighed nothing.
I turned slightly and winced.The bedroom around me came into focus slowly.Thick drapes.Dark furniture.Too much space.Too much calm.
I was back at his house.
A strange, conflicted feeling tightened in my chest.Relief.And something sharper.
What if he didn’t want me here?
He’d been so quick to take me home before.So decisive.So firm about it being “the right thing.”What if bringing me back here was just… temporary?Damage control.
What if I was trouble now?Not just inconvenient.What if I’d dragged chaos to his door?
My stomach twisted.I tried to push myself up and immediately regretted it.A hiss escaped my mouth before I could stop it.My muscles protested.My head swam.
The door opened softly.
I froze.
Raze stepped inside.
He moved slowly, as though trying to be careful not to wake me.His eyes swept the room once before settling on me.
“You’re awake.”
