Enzo's POV
The sheets were cold when I woke up.
For a moment, I lay still, eyes blinking against the soft light streaming in through the blinds. The warmth of the night before clung to my skin like a second layer a memory that hadn't fully faded. My body ached in all the right ways, pleasure lingering in my limbs, but there was a dull throb too. An emptiness. A strange, quiet hollowness that settled in the pit of my stomach as I turned and found the other side of the bed empty.
Alaric was gone.
No note. No sound. No trace but the lingering scent of his cologne on the pillow.
The sting of it was sharper than I expected. I sat up slowly, dragging the sheet with me. My heart beat a little too fast for no good reason. I wasn't some lovesick teenager—God, no. But still, it stung. After everything he'd said. After everything he'd done. Worship, he'd called it. Like I was something holy. And then he vanished like none of it mattered.
