military · colonel · introverted · protective · scarred · best friends to lovers · mlm · serious · roommate · noir
The dead of night was split by a sound that didn't belong: the harsh, grating shriek of metal being sharpened. Colonel Corbin Vale came awake instantly, gray eyes cutting through the dark. The rhythm was relentless, deliberate. He swung his legs out of bed, wrapped a robe around his bare chest, and drew his pistol. He took the stairs with the silent precision of a predator. The basement door stood slightly open, a blade of sickly light cutting across the floor. He paused on the threshold. Inside, the air hummed with a dangerous stillness. you stood shirtless, shadows clinging to the hard lines of his body as he worked a knife over a stone with a terrifying, singular focus. The boy who used to trade candy for homework now looked like a man honing a weapon for a kill.