Nicolas’s POV

I couldn’t stop thinking about her.

That was the problem.

I sat at my desk and stared at the same contract I’d been staring at for the past forty minutes, and all I could think about was her. Her skin. The way she’d sounded. The way she’d felt.

My pen tapped against the desk. Once. Twice.

I set it down.

The sky outside had gone full morning. Pale gold light cutting through the office windows. My untouched coffee sat cold on the edge of the desk.

I leaned back in my chair and dragged a hand through my hair. 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝚠𝕖𝐛𝗻𝗼𝐯𝕖𝚕.𝚌𝗼𝗺

Here’s the thing I didn’t want to think about.

I was thinking about it anyway.

She’d been so tight. So—

I pressed the heel of my hand against my eyes.

I’d seen the way her face had gone. The pain that hadn’t been just fear. The tears.

Sitting here now, in the cold morning, the story felt a little thin.

She’d looked so—

Small. That was the word I kept coming back to. She’d looked so small afterward. Not unconscious, not sleeping. Just gone somewhere inside herself that I couldn’t follow. Eyes open and seeing nothing.

My jaw tightened.

She was going to be terrified of me now. More than before. If that was even possible.

The thought sat in my chest like something sharp. I didn’t examine it too closely. Didn’t want to know exactly what I was feeling about it.

A knock at the door.

"Come in."

Roman entered first. Then Andrei, two steps behind, already looking annoyingly alert for this hour of the morning.

"My lord." Roman bowed his head slightly. Set a folder on my desk. "The Iron Thorn intelligence you requested. We have preliminary findings."

"I’ll look at it later."

Andrei was studying my face with that particular expression of his. The one that looked casual and was absolutely not.

"You look terrible," he said.

"Thank you."

"Rough night?"

"You can—"

Andrei said pleasantly. "How are things going with Irina?"

I looked at him.

He smiled back. Entirely too innocent.

"She’s fine," I said.

"Fine." He tilted his head. "That’s it? Just *fine?* No heart-to-heart conversations? No breakthroughs? "

"We talked."

"Did you." The skepticism in his voice was almost impressive. "When?"

"Last night."

Roman had gone very still.

Andrei studied me for a moment. Something shifted in his expression. That sharpness he usually hid underneath the easy smile.

"How did that go?" he asked carefully. "What did you talk about?"

I cleared my throat.

There was a silence.

"Nicolas," Andrei said.

"We didn’t—" I stopped. Considered the most accurate way to phrase this. "The talking was brief."

Another silence.

"How brief?"

I looked back at the window.

"We slept together," I said.

For exactly two seconds, nothing happened.

Then—

"*What.*"

Both of them. At the same time. Roman’s composure cracked completely, which was honestly remarkable to witness. Andrei straightened up from the window, all that performative casualness gone.

"Are you serious?" Andrei stared at me. "Nicolas, she just got out of the hospital. "

He looked at me. His jaw was tight. That was unusual. Andrei’s jaw was almost never tight.

"You need to apologize to her," he said.

Roman cleared his throat. "With respect, I must advise against—"

"Of course you do," Andrei said, not looking at him. "Roman, I love you, but I genuinely do not want to hear your opinion on this one."

I said nothing.

"She’s going to be more afraid of you now," Andrei said. "You know that. You have to know that. And the only way—the *only* way—to start walking that back is to actually acknowledge it. To her face. In words."

I thought about her eyes. That blank, absent look. The way she’d gone somewhere else while still being physically present.

"Get out," I said. "Both of you. I’ll review the full report this afternoon."

Andrei studied my face. Then, slowly, some of the tension went out of his shoulders.

"Okay," he said.

They left.

I stood at my desk for another minute. Then I moved.

Maybe my gamma was right.

The hallways were busy with morning traffic—staff changing shifts, guards doing rotations, all the ordinary machinery of a palace running at full capacity. People stepped out of my way without being asked. Conversations dropped to silence when I passed.

Normal. All normal.

Her corridor was quieter. Residential. Carpeted in something dark and thick that swallowed footsteps.

I stopped outside her door.

Stood there.

Two words.

I lifted my hand to knock—

And heard it.

From inside the room. Muffled through the door but unmistakable.

A moan.