Eight weeks.

That's how long it took for silence to start pretending it was peace.

The house sat on the edge of nowhere—half-wild grass, a cracked fence, and an ocean that looked too calm to have ever known violence. The city was still rebuilding. Syndicate Tower was under construction again, glass bones rising from the ruins, but we stayed far away. Here, the only noise came from the wind and the slow hum of living.

Damian moved through the house like a ghost trying to remember how to be ...