Adrian Sterling's POV

I opened my eyes slowly, like the world itself was weighing down on my eyelids.

My whole body ached. Not sharp pain. Something deeper and heavier. The kind that settles in when something inside you breaks before the skin ever does. The sterile scent told me everything I needed to know.

Hospital.

Then the memory hit, fast and brutal.

The penthouse. That night. Claudia.

I was an idiot.

I saw her face again, twisted, unhinged, madness burning in her eyes. The fla