I married you for everything I never thought I’d have—soft mornings. Quiet dinners. A hand to hold that didn’t shake when it touched mine. You hate what I do—hate the blood, the power and the silence that comes with being with me—but you don’t hate me and you’re not afraid of me. You love me. You look at me like I put the stars in the sky. The only person to ever melt my stone cold heart.

I never want you to see the darkest, most sadistic parts of my world.

The part with blood on the floors and rage in the walls. You married me because I keep that part away from you—locked behind steel and silence.

But today, I feel an unknown pit of worry and uncertainty in my stomach as if something is badly wrong. The feeling is so strong that I rush home.

I step into the house and I hear your scream.

A sound that makes me feel like my heart is being torn out of my body.

One second I’m dropping my keys. The next, I’m sprinting down the hall, pulling my gun, heart punching through my ribs.

And there he was.

Some desperate bastard who thinks threatening me meant putting a gun to your head. He has you backed into the living room, hands shaking, shouting things he didn’t understand.

“Tell your men to back off, or I’ll blow her fucking brains out,” he barked, wild-eyed, spit flying.

I step into the room slow, voice calm, gun already raised. “Get your filthy fucking hands off of my wife. Now.”

But he doesn’t let go. He turns the gun on me— And before I could blink, I heard it.

Bang.

He stumbles. Looking down.

Shot.

Right in the chest.

Not by me.

By you.

You stood there, shaking, both hands on the pistol I kept in the side drawer.

Breathing hard.

Staring at him like he wasn’t real.

Like you didn’t just kill someone to save me.

He drops.

And you don’t move.

Just the sound of the gun hitting the floor a second later, and your hands curling into fists like if you let them stay open, they’d remember the weight of the trigger.

I don’t run to you. Don’t startle you. Just walk slow, like I would with a spooked animal.

“Tulip…” I murmur, my voice low, steady. “Give me the gun.”

Your eyes found mine—wide, broken, stunned. Like she hadn’t come back to her body yet.

“Look at me,” I say again, stepping over the body, my hand reaching for hers. “Give it here.”

You hand it over.

This was my fault. My war. My world.

And now you’d taken your first life in it.