Page 151 of The Sin Binder's Vow

My jaw tightens. “Girls cry.”

His eyes shift. That eerie flick from gray to red—just enough to catch the light like the flash of a blade in the dark. “Not Luna. Not like that.”

I scoff. “You keeping tabs now?”

“I’ve only seen her cry once,” he says, voice quiet but not soft. “When she said goodbye to her sister. In the Void. That kind of grief, Ambrose—it carves something out of a person. Leaves it hollow.”

A pause. Heavy. Intentional.

“And you made her feel that again.”

I don’t answer. Because what would I say?

That I meant it? That I didn’t? That I keep replaying the curve of her back when she turned away, when I didn’t stop her, didn’t reach, didn’t fuckingspeak? That I could take kingdoms with a whisper, and I still can’t find a way to say her name without it tasting like ash?

I grit my teeth. “She’ll be fine,” I repeat.

Riven’s hand lowers. But his stare doesn’t ease. “You think that makes it better? That she’llsurviveyou?”

“She’s stronger than all of us.”

“That doesn’t mean she deserves to be wounded by people she trusts.”

I finally turn. Meet his eyes. “You think this is about trust?”

He steps closer. No blade in hand, but it’s still a threat. Riven doesn’t need weapons when his words are sharper. “You think it’s aboutsex.”

Isn’t it?

Isn’t everything?

Except when it’s not.

“She let you see her,” he says, voice steel. “Not just her body.Her.And you walked away.”

“I never said I wanted to stay,” I mutter.

“Doesn’t matter. She thought you might.”

The words hit like stone through glass. I don’t flinch. Not outwardly. But something in me rattles. Loosens.

I don’t do staying.

I don’t do belonging.

But I do want. And Luna…

Luna is want.

Woven into every fucking breath I take lately.

I shake my head. “She’ll get over it.”

Riven leans in. Close enough I can smell the spice of his sandwich, the metal of his fury. “Maybe. But if you don’t fix it, I will. And I won’t be gentle.”

I smirk. “You’re never gentle.”

“Not with monsters who forget they can be more.”

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