Kabir never slept beside her.
He’d use her, command her, kiss her like a threat—but he always left her alone afterward. Cold sheets. Cold heart.
Until tonight.
Meher woke to the weight of him beside her, shirtless, breath uneven, arm draped protectively over her waist. Not possessive. Not cruel.
Just… human.
She didn’t move. She only listened—to the silence between his exhales. To the way his hand twitched like he was fighting something even in his dreams.
“Don’t leave…” he mumbled suddenly, half-asleep.
Meher’s breath caught.
He didn’t say it like a command.
He said it like a memory.
The scar on his chest—she’d noticed it before, long and jagged near his heart.
Now she traced it gently.
Kabir flinched awake, eyes wild. But when he saw her, his guard shattered for a blink.
“You were dreaming,” she whispered.
He didn’t speak. Just looked at her. Like she was something he didn’t know how to hold without breaking it.
“You’ve been hurt,” she said.
“We all have,” he replied. “Mine just left bigger stains.”
For the first time, she didn’t see the Butcher of Delhi.
She saw the boy who had once bled alone. Who’d built walls with violence because love never stayed.
And for a moment, just one,
Meher forgot to hate him.
Because monsters don’t cry in their sleep.
But broken men do.
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