Jul hadn’t meant to sit beside another man. Not deliberately. Not spitefully. It was simply the seat offered. One chair away from the only exit, away from the gaze that had tracked her across the rooftop like heat without flame.

There is a moment when care and control look identical, and you only realize the difference when it is too late. Damon called it safety. Selene called it love. By the second month, her world had quietly folded into his — new locks, shared keys, fewer words of her own. When a friend names the orbit she’s trapped in, Selene begins to sense the invisible walls closing, even as she tightens her grip on the very keys that bind her.