“Don’t talk,” he says. “Hear.”
I do.
And there it is—
The faintest scrape of stone somewhere behind the cloister wall.
Too intentional to be wind.Too soft to be an animal.
My breath catches.
He heard it too. I see it in the way his shoulders tense, the way his posture shifts half an inch toward threat-mode, the way his eyes narrow like he’s tracking a ghost.
“What the fuck was that?” I whisper.
Santino doesn’t answer.
Which tells me everything.
He turns his head just enough to look at me—dark eyes burning, jaw tight, breath steady in that lethal, controlled way that says he’s seconds from violence.
“Don’t fall behind me,” he says quietly. “Not tonight.”
Not tonight.
The words punch deep—cold and hot at the same time.
They confirm what I already feel twisting low in my stomach—
There is someone out here with us.Someone who knows where we are.Someone who watched me walk into the church…and followed.
Santino’s gaze sweeps the courtyard again, and for a split second, something feral flickers in his eyes.
Protective.Possessive.Dangerous.
“This doesn’t feel right,” I murmur.
“No shit,” he mutters. “Stay close.”
And for once in my fucked-up life, I don’t argue.
Not because I’m weak.Not because I trust him.
I know a hunter’s presence when it breathes down my neck.
And tonight…
I can smell blood in the air.
Mine.Or his.
We step into the dark together.
The Ambush
The alley behind the church feels wrong the second we step into it—like the night tightens around us, like the darkness is waiting for something to happen. The space is narrow, squeezed between old brick and rusted dumpsters, a claustrophobic slice of shadow that smells like wet stone and old secrets.
Santino moves ahead of me, a living wall of muscle and tension. His shoulders are rigid, his stride precise, silent. Every inch of him coils as he listens and hunts. I can practically feel the violence simmering beneath his skin—the part of him the collar never truly tamed.
