The door creaked open.
A shaft of light spilled across the sterile floor, cutting through the dim hush of the hospital room.
Alessia's breath caught as a silhouette stepped inside — tall, familiar in posture but softened by exhaustion.
Her heart stumbled in her chest.
"Luca…" she said to him.
He stood there for a moment, as if afraid that moving might shatter the fragile stillness holding them apart.
His coat was damp from the rain, his hair disheveled, his eyes rimmed with sleeplessness.
Yet even in that disarray, he carried the quiet gravity of a man who had fought storms to get here.
"It's me," he said quietly. His voice.. hoarse, raw, reached her before he did.
Alessia's lips trembled. She wanted to rise, to throw herself into his arms, but the IV line tugged at her wrist.
Luca crossed the space in two long strides and dropped to his knees beside her bed.
His hands found hers — cold against warm, trembling against steady.
