2:03 AM
The door to the dorm clicked shut behind Nox, silent as always. The hallway was dim, the silence heavier than usual. Leo was deep asleep—or so Nox thought.
He walked straight to the bathroom, one hand pressed lightly against the still-bleeding edge of the stitched wound on his neck. The sting didn't even register.
He turned the water on hot, steam curling instantly in the small space. The mirror fogged quickly, and he dropped the black hoodie to the floor. His shirt followed, already stiff with dried blood. Bandages soaked through and fell off as he unwrapped them. The scar was clean, but fresh. A red line dragged across the side of his neck, glistening, brutal.
He sighed as the water ran over his skin. Just a towel hung low around his waist, condensation running along the ridges of his abs and piercing. His body was a battlefield—old scars, some surgical, some knife wounds, some bullet grazes. Each one whispered a story. The thorny black tattoo spiraled along his spine, jagged and striking like a crown of thorns trailing downward.
Nox tied his black hair into a messy bun, a few soaked strands falling across his forehead. Violet eyes flicked toward the mirror, hard and clinical.
He began redressing the wound, re-stitching one torn thread with surgical precision. No flinching. No wasted motion.
Then the door opened.
Leo froze in the doorway, barefoot, blinking against the warm mist.
His voice caught. "Nox?"
The taller man stiffened, the suture needle still in hand. He didn't turn around.
Leo stepped closer, stunned. "You—, you got hurt."
Still, no response.
His eyes tracked the long spine tattoo, the deep violet scar, the lean but deadly lines of Nox's body the spark of his red Belly-buttonpiercing. It was the first time in a year and three months that he'd seen the mask stripped away. Not just physically, but in that unguarded moment, that single window of raw, silent pain.
He wasn't just beautiful. He was tragic.
Nox quietly finished tying the new bandage. Then, wordlessly, he pulled on a long black hoodie that swallowed his form. Mask on. Hair tucked. Everything locked away again.
He finally turned to Leo.
"You don't have to say anything. It was my choice."
Leo opened his mouth, but Nox cut him off, his voice low and flat.
"But stop being stubborn. You need your father."
He walked past Leo like a ghost, heading to the rooftop.
Leo's POV
The door clicked again.
Leo stood in the steam, stunned.
His chest ached with confusion, guilt, shame, and something else. Something nameless.
The memory of the ambush played over again in his mind: Nox's silent intervention. The glint of the blade. The blood. Ash chatting cluelessly while Nox held his throat and told Leo to get help.
Leo had pretended everything was fine. He'd texted his father, requested the clean-up crew, and pretended Nox wasn't bleeding. Pretended he wasn't shaken.
But now...
That image.That face ,That body. That look in Nox's eyes.
Leo walked out of the bathroom, slow and heavy. He closed his door behind him and leaned back against it.
You can't keep running.
That's what Nox had said, in his own way.
Leo had clung to the illusion of a normal life so hard it blinded him. He let himself believe Ash was the center of his feelings. That their life was simple. That Nox was just a quiet, strange roommate with trust issues.
But he knew better now.
Nox had nearly died. He hadn't made a sound.
And Leo saw it.
He saw the way Nox didn't flinch when injured. The way he refused help. The way he disappeared after saving them. Then stitched himself together alone.
Leo thought he was escaping the world he was born into. But it had followed him. Watched him. Protected him.
Nox had protected him.
Why?
Leo lay on his bed, staring at the ceiling.
He didn't have the answer.
But maybe he didn't want to keep lying about what kind of story he was really in.
End of Chapter 49