“You’re late.”
Two words. Low. Controlled. Worse than shouting.
I swallowed, my throat clicking loudly in the silence.
“We were short on nurses,” I said softly. “They asked me to stay until the on-call team arrived. I didn’t get a chance to call. I’m sorry.”
He lifted the glass and drained it in one slow swallow. Never breaking eye contact. Never blinking.
“Elijah,” he said, almost gently. “You know you’re supposed to call me when you’re going to be late, sweetheart.”
I try to pull in a lungful of air, but my lungs aren’t working properly. My chest is tight and painful as I watch him carefully.
“You know I like to know where you are.”
Same voice. Same calm. That’s what made it worse.
My body reacted before my mind could finish naming the danger, shoulders tightening, breath shortening, a familiar sickening preparation.
“I know,” I started quickly. Too quickly. “But we had…”
The glass misses my head by inches, and it detonates against the wall behind me.
I don’t move.
I don’t even flinch.
I’ve learned that movement only ever makes things worse.
“I don’t care what you had,” he snaps.
Then he’s on me.
The room doesn’t feel like it shifts; It collapses. One moment he’s by the window, still holding himself together, and the next, his hand is around my throat.
“You,” he says. A hard squeeze. “Didn’t. Call.”
Each word lands like it’s been carved out of him and forced through clenched teeth. There’s no softness in him now.
No partner.
No warmth.
Only anger…and something worse beneath it.
Possession.
I manage, “I’m sorry…” But I don’t get further.
His grip tightens, and I’m slammed back into the wall so hard the air tears out of my lungs. Pain flashes white up my spine and my vision blurs.
For a second there’s nothing but sound and pressure and the feeling that the room has tilted away from me.
“I’m sorry, Aidy,” I choke out when I can breathe again. “You’re right. I should have called.”
It comes out fractured. Too loud. Too desperate. The kind of apology that isn’t really an apology; It’s survival.
Adrian lifted a hand.
