Two days.
That was how long it had been since Vincent De Luca had claimed her in every way that counted. Two days since she'd woken in sheets that smelled of him, since she'd walked a corridor full of guards who'd looked at her like something had permanently shifted. Two days of learning the weight of his name on her finger, of fitting herself into a world that wasn't hers, of sleeping in rooms adjacent to a man she wasn't sure whether to fear or hate more.
The soreness had faded to something manageable. The marks had started to yellow at the edges. What remained was sharper — not physical. Something that lived behind her sternum and didn't have a clean name yet.
