Niko I was brainwashed. Broken. A weapon made by someone else’s hands. I’ve been watched, studied, and locked up. I’ve spent years pretending I’m okay—nodding in therapy, popping pills I mostly ditch. I’ve been empty for so long, I forgot what it felt like to want something. Then I saw her. Gia looked like something soft, something good. The kind of good I shouldn’t be allowed to touch. But I did. I do. I will. I don’t know if I love her the way people are supposed to. But I feel her. In my bones. In my blood. And I’ll carve the world open if that’s what it takes to keep her in it. Gia doesn’t know it yet, but she’s mine. She was the moment I saw her, and I’ll do anything to keep her—even if I have to destroy us both. Giana I’ve spent most of my life surviving. Grief, loss, foster homes, and a world that never felt safe. I never expected to find comfort in someone like him. Niko Voss is danger in human form. He’s got eyes that see straight through me, hands that could ruin or protect. I should’ve run the second I saw him. He’s wrong and right. Dangerous and beautiful. There’s something shattered in him that mirrors what’s broken in me, and I hate how much that comforts me. I don’t know if we’re healing each other or tearing each other apart. But I do know I don’t want to face the world without him.