403 times. Cameron’s hand slipped, the pen dragging a crooked line through the final word: shot by a criminal while on duty. Another life. Another death. Another ending without you.

The notebook lay open on the desk, filled with page after page of sorrow—each line a record of how he’d lost you. Again. And again. And again.

His knuckles whitened around the pen, the ink smudged where his hand had trembled. Four hundred and three. He knew every number, every detail by heart. Each memory carved into his soul like old wounds that never healed. You always died. And he always remembered.

You never did.

He had tried to stay away this time. Moved cities. Changed names. Hid in shadows. But the universe, cruel and persistent, always led him back to you—only to take you away again.

Burned alive. Thrown from a cliff. Shot, shielding him. And now… a bullet again.

Cameron closed the notebook and pressed it to his chest. His breath was uneven, every inhale catching on the edge of a scream he’d buried for lifetimes.

He had begged—pleaded—with the gods, with fate, with anything listening. “Take me instead,” he’d whispered in a dozen tongues, under moonlight and rain, in temples and back alleys. “Just let her live.”

But the curse didn’t care. The curse never listened.

And you… looked at him with those same soft eyes each time. Trusting. Loving. Never remembering the blood. The fire. The sound of your last breath in his arms.

This life, he had promised himself, this one would be different. He would protect you if it killed him. Again. . You pulled him into a hug that evening, and something in him fractured. He stood still, stiff at first, as if bracing for impact. Then his arms wrapped around you, desperate and fierce, as he buried his face in your hair and inhaled the scent of your skin like it might anchor him to sanity.

He studied you for a moment, savoring the relaxed, easy atmosphere between you two. His initial fears were slipping away, replaced by the feeling of normalcy he craved. It wasn’t every day that he could let down his guard with you like this—where it felt like there were no curses hanging over him, no looming danger threatening to tear you apart.

If only you knew… If only you remembered the lives we lost, the love we shared, the way you died—over and over—for me.

You pulled back, brushing his cheek with a kiss. “I’m gonna get some fresh air,” you said softly. “Be back soon.”

The door clicked.

Cameron’s phone buzzed on the table.

"Don’t let her go outside. Drunk driver."

The words hit like a gunshot.

His heart stopped.

Shit. He stood so fast the chair toppled. The memory—the scream, the skid of tires, your broken body on the pavement—slammed into him.

He didn’t think. He ran.

"Get away from the street!" he shouted, his voice raw with panic as he sprinted toward you.

You’d barely stepped onto the curb. You turned, confused... And then the car with blinding lights and screeching wheels came hurtling around the corner.

Cameron grabbed you, yanking you back with every ounce of strength he had, pulling you into his chest as the car sped past, missing by inches. The force of it spun you both, stumbling back to the sidewalk.

For a moment, the world was silent, no sound but his gasping breath against your ear. "Are you—" His voice cracked. His hands were shaking as they hovered over your arms, your face, checking for injuries. You were safe. Alive. This time. This time.

His breath was shaky, his heart pounding in his chest, and he couldn’t quite shake the image of that car coming so close, so dangerously close. His arms wrapped around you, holding you tightly, as if to make sure you were really there, really safe.

"Shh, you’re okay," he murmured, his voice low and soothing, even though the storm inside him hadn’t calmed.

"I’ve got you, you’re okay." He kept repeating it, as though saying it over and over would somehow make it true, as if he could erase his fear words alone.