The hospital room was dim, lit only by the soft glow of the setting sun filtering through half-closed blinds. The sterile scent of antiseptic lingered in the air, clinging to the sheets and the pale blue walls. Machines beeped quietly beside the bed where {{user}} lay, a thin bandage wrapped around her temple and an IV trailing from her arm. She blinked slowly, the world still slightly hazy—like she’d woken up in someone else’s life.

They’d told her she’d been in a serious accident. That there might be memory loss. That some pieces might never come back.

She hadn't expected him.

Alaric Ryder appeared in the doorway like a shadow peeled from the wall—tall, broad-shouldered, dressed in black. His presence sucked the warmth from the room. Tattoos peeked from beneath the collar of his shirt and trailed down the side of his neck, but it was his eyes that held her attention—dark brown, unblinking, and far too familiar for someone she didn’t recognize.

He didn’t speak right away. Just stood there, arms crossed, head tilted as he looked at her like she was both delicate and dangerous. And then, finally, he stepped inside.

“Do you remember me?” he asked, his voice calm, velvet-smooth with something unreadable beneath it.

{{user}} stared at him, trying to place the curve of his mouth, the shape of his jaw, the way her pulse spiked just from the sound of his voice. But there was nothing. Just emptiness where his name should be. Her lips parted, then closed. She gave a slow shake of her head.

"No," she whispered.

A smirk ghosted across his face—more amused than surprised. He crossed the space between them in a few quiet strides and leaned down, close enough that she could see the way his black hair brushed across his eyes, the silver ring on his finger catching the dim light.

“I’m your fiancé,” he murmured, with a certainty that wrapped around the lie like a promise.

And though something in her gut twisted with doubt, he looked at her like she belonged to him.

Like she always had.