Chapter 116 Refuge In The Heart

• The villa was quiet in the way only safe places ever were.
• Not empty—never that—but settled. Breathing. Holding.
• Lucy woke to the soft sound of wood being worked somewhere nearby, the steady scrape-and-tap rhythm gentle enough not to disturb the morning. Pale light filtered through the wide windows, catching on the stone floors and the pale curtains that stirred faintly as warm air moved through the space.