Damian's POV
The call came out of nowhere.
I'd been sitting in my office, the city lights bleeding through the glass like restless fireflies, when her name appeared on my screen — Emma Lawson. For a second, I thought I was imagining it. My thumb hovered over the phone, my pulse steady, but my breath… not so much.
I answered before I could think. "Emma."
Her silence said more than her words ever could. That single moment — the faint catch in her breath, the quiet hesitation — it pulled me back to every night I'd watched her fall asleep beside me, the way she'd whisper my name like it was both a question and an answer.
And then she spoke, soft, careful. "Hi. I hope I'm not calling too late."
Too late? She could've called me at midnight and I'd still have picked up. Hell, she could've called me after a decade, and it still wouldn't have been too late.
