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He just stands there in the doorway, all scar and shadow and muscle, watching like he’s daring me to collapse. His face is carved into something hard—rage held back by restraint, both of them ugly.

“Gave you a week, kid,” he says. His voice is gravel, scraped raw. “Time’s up. Get the fuck up and back to it.”

The words hit harder than the water.

A week. As if grief runs on fucking shifts. Like Scarlett’s death is something that should’ve bruised and faded. Like Cass walking away was a clock he’d already decided was done ticking.

A laugh tears out of me, broken and hollow. “A whole week?” I choke. “How incredibly generous of you.”

Something flashes in his eyes—silver cold, brown burning. “Grief doesn’t get to kill you twice. Get up.”

And something inside me finally gives.

Not softly.

Not cleanly.

It snaps.

He says it like she never mattered. Like none of it did. Like her death is a item he crossed off a list.

My fist is moving before I know I’ve decided.

The impact is wrong—too soft, too wet. Something in his face gives. Pain detonates up my arm, bright and blinding, and blood goes everywhere—my skin, the tile, his mouth. It’s warmer than I expect. Thicker. Real.

For a split second, I can’t breathe.

I stare at my hand, slick and shaking, horror flooding in so fast my vision swims.

He doesn’t fall.

Malek straightens like something hauled up from the ground. Blood runs freely now, tracing the old scars in his face, filling the grooves like it belongs there. His silver eye goes sharp and bright. The brown one goes flat. Calculating.

My hand screams. Every heartbeat sends another spike of pain through it. I let it. The ache keeps me here—proof I’m still breathing, still made of something other than loss.

He doesn’t wipe his face. Doesn’t even blink.

He just looks at me.

For a moment he’s somewhere else, jaw tight, breath slow and measured, like he’s deciding what this costs. Then his gaze drops to the blood on his lip.

And he licks it away.

Slow. Deliberate. Tongue dragging along the cut like he’s testing the damage, like the taste confirms something. It leaves a smear, darker and wetter than before.

My skin crawls.

He lifts his eyes back to mine, head tilting a fraction. Assessing, like I’ve just crossed a line he’s been standing on for a long time.

When he speaks, his voice is low and even.

Controlled.

“Don’t,” he says. A pause. Then quieter, colder. “Ever do that again.”

The words crawl down my spine, colder than the water still needling my skin.

Then he turns and pauses at the door.