Trust.
The training exercise went wrong faster than either of us expected.
My foot slipped on wet leaves during weapons practice, and the gun discharged into the dirt—six inches from Alessio's boot.
The crack of the gunshot echoed through the forest, then terrible silence.
"I could've killed you," I whispered, hands shaking so badly I couldn't hold the weapon anymore.
He took it gently, set it aside, his movements calm despite what had just happened. "But you didn't."
"I could've—if you'd been standing one step to the left—"
"Valentina." He gripped my shoulders, forced me to meet his eyes. "You didn't. I'm fine. We're both fine."
But I couldn't stop shaking. Couldn't stop seeing the alternate reality where the bullet found flesh instead of earth. Where I'd killed the man I—
The man I loved.
He pulled me against his chest, one hand stroking my hair while I fell apart.
"I've killed people," he said quietly. "In this life, that's what you do to survive. But you? You're not built for violence. You're built for better things—art and beauty and creation. And I'm terrified I'm turning you into something you're not."
I pulled back to look at him. "You're not turning me into anything. You're teaching me to survive long enough to become who I'm meant to be. There's a difference."
"Is there?" His voice was raw, vulnerable in ways I'd rarely seen. "Because I look at you holding that gun and I think about Eva. How the violence found her, even though she wanted nothing to do with it. What if I'm doing the same thing to you?"
"You're not." I cupped his face, made him see me. Really see me. "Eva didn't choose this world. I did. I chose to run from Marco and Richard. I chose you over the easy path. And I'm choosing to learn how to fight back. That's not you corrupting me—that's me becoming stronger."
His forehead pressed against mine, and I felt him trembling slightly. This dangerous man was shaking because he was afraid of hurting me.
"You're already the strongest person I know," he whispered.
"Then trust me to make my own choices. Including this one." I held his gaze. "Including you."
"Even though I'm dangerous?"
"Especially because you're dangerous." I smiled despite the tears. "Because you're using that danger to protect me instead of controlling me. That's the difference between you and Marco."
He kissed me then—soft and desperate and full of everything we weren't saying out loud but both feeling.
We sat on the cabin porch as sunset painted the mountains gold and amber, wrapped in blankets against the cold.
"What happens after?" I asked, my head on his shoulder, his arm around me—this closeness so natural now I couldn't remember when we'd started gravitating toward each other.
"After Marco?"
"After everything. When I'm safe. When you're not bound by blood oaths or family obligations. What do you want?"
He was quiet for a long moment, thumb tracing circles on my shoulder in that absent, soothing way he'd developed.
"I never let myself imagine a future before," he admitted. "In my world, you plan for next week, maybe next month. Thinking further felt like tempting fate."
"And now?"
"Now I can't stop thinking about it." His voice dropped lower. "Small town where nobody knows our names. House with a yard. You teaching at some community college, and I'm doing something normal—that bookstore we joked about, maybe. Kids playing in the yard while we cook Sunday dinner."
My breath caught. "Kids?"
