Elena’s POV

I woke before the alarm.

The room was still dim, the kind of gray that comes just before the city fully decides to open its eyes. Rain had stopped sometime in the night, but the air that slipped through the cracked window still carried that wet, metallic scent. For a moment I just lay there, staring at the ceiling, feeling the quiet weight of everything that had happened the day before settle over me like another blanket.

The photograph.

I had shoved it back under the pillow eventually, but I hadn’t slept well. Every time I closed my eyes I saw that half-turned face, those eyes that felt...