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His mouth twitches—not quite a smile. “That’s fair. I’m Lucas.”

Behind him, the sound carries.

Bone against wood.

A pleased, ruined moan follows and then stops so suddenly my stomach knows what happened before my mind does.

I don’t flinch. I refuse to move.

And when Malek doesn’t tell him to step aside—when he lets the man stay between us like it’s always been that way—I finally understand.

Whatever Lucas is to Malek, he’s not a threat. He’s a witness, a line that’s already been tested.

So I stay where I am, and I trust the silence Malek leaves behind.

Malek doesn’t look at me when he returns.

His hand closes around my wrist—firm, controlled, careful in a way that still feels like command—and turns me toward the house.

Not dragging.

Not gentle either.

Holding on like if he lets go, the world might remember I’m standing there.

Behind us, Lucas shifts into place without being told. Shadow moves with him, dropping into a low, watchful prowl, ears pinned, eyes locked on the butcher block and the thing kneeling near it. A line forms without words. I don’t trust Lucas—not yet—but Malek doesn’t brace around him. Doesn’t check angles. Doesn’t tighten.

That tells me enough.

I glance back once—toward the trees, toward the slab already dark with old blood and waiting for more—but Malek’s grip tightens just enough to pull my focus forward.

He waits until I step fully inside before closing the door. The click is soft. Careful. Like he’s trying not to break whatever thin thread is still holding the room together. His hand lingers on the doorframe before he turns toward me.

I grab the shirt he abandoned on the kitchen chair earlier and toss it to him without a word.

He catches it midair with that unnerving ease he never explains. Pulls it over his head, smearing flecks of blood across his face into darker streaks before they disappear beneath the collar.

Then he stills—watching me, chest tight, like he’s measuring the damage and the girl who walked back through his door.

“You kept my picture.”

His jaw flexes. His hands stay loose at his sides, like fists are the instinct he’s fighting.

“Yes.” No apology. No defense. Just the truth, held exactly where it can’t be softened. A breath passes between us.

“I didn’t keep it because I wanted to own you. I kept it because I needed something in the world that reminded me why I hadn’t burned it all down.”

His eyes lift to mine then—stripped of myth, stripped of armor.

“And because if the Iron Gospel ever found you,” he adds quietly, lethally, “I needed to recognize what they were holding before they finished the sentence.”

There it is.

“You keep things where they can’t touch you back.” My voice softens before I can stop it. “Pictures. Distance. Control. Me.”

That one lands. I see it.

“You don’t even realize you do it,” I whisper. “But you do.”