The library was quieter than usual that afternoon.
No, it wasn't just quiet. It was heavy.
It was the kind of silence that felt like it was pressing down on the lungs until every breath felt like a chore. The only thing breaking the stillness was the rhythmic flip-flip of pages and the distant, sharp scrape of a chair across the polished floor.
Seraphina sat at the farthest table, tucked away in the shadows of the history section.
A book lay open before her. She hadn't read a single word.
Her eyes tracked the ink, but the letters were nothing more than meaningless squiggles. Meaning slipped through her grasp like water through a sieve.
Her mind wasn't in the library. It hadn't been for days.
And then… there was him.
Damon De Luca.
Always watching..Always there, lingering in her peripheral vision like a ghost that refused to be exorcised.
Logically, his presence should have made her feel safe. He was a shield. A wall of muscle and cold intent.
