His jacket and tie are absent, and my gaze stalls on his collarbone. He’s dressed casually for the evening, with the top three buttons of his shirt undone. Something about his skin beckons. Without conscious thought, I work my arms out of the blanket and trail my fingers over his throat.

He’s smooth and warm and⁠—

“Novalee.” His thick murmur halts my hand. “You’re worrying me.”

“Why?”

“Because I found you freezing in the snow,” he says, brows arching in disbelief, “without a jacket or a pair of shoes. What were you doing out there?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?”

I’m sure if I think long and hard, I can come up with an explanation, but I don’t have the energy. Besides, the sad truth is…

“I don’t remember.”

Liam’s mouth tightens into a thin line, yet his touch remains gentle as he cups my cheek. “Tell me what to do, please.”

“There’s nothing,” I whisper, the emptiness inside me growing deeper.

A soft knock interrupts the grave moment, and my bedroom door opens to reveal Vance. The sudden appearance of the doctor sends a jolt of adrenaline through me, and I sit up straight as hope crashes into my chest, tangling with a complex blend of anger and fear.

Because I don’t trust hope—not when it’s done nothing but yank me around in unabashed violence since the day I was born.

And yet…

I can’t help but ask the only question worth asking. “Did they find him?”

Vance gives his blond head a solemn shake. He normally wears his hair in a ponytail, but now it falls past his shoulders, wild and messy, like he’s been running his fingers through it all day.

“No sign of survivors,” he says quietly. “Axel’s body was recovered a few days ago, but…”

Dread bands around my chest. “But they’re still looking, right?”

Liam rises to join Vance, and my gaze darts between them, desperation cresting. No one speaks at first, and that’s when I ache for the numbness of winter air, the crash of waves, the endless dark.

The fog.

God, bring the fog back, because I can’t face the answer written in Vance’s expression—as if he’s trying to swallow the words so he won’t have to say them out loud.

“It’s been a week, Novalee.”

A week.

Seven days.

168 hours.

10,000 and some odd minutes since Sebastian’s plane went down, and my world imploded.

It feels longer.

It feels like it happened five minutes ago.

That day is a blur, just distorted images I don’t want to remember, and yet I still recall Liam and the Brotherhood ambushing me in my studio with the news. Can still smell Liam’s spicy cologne as he engulfed me in his arms. Still hear the wailing and screaming.

My screaming.