LEAVE ME BEHIND

Connor Mason knows exactly what it costs to be seen.

In the army, reputation is survival. One wrong move, one rumour, one moment of weakness in front of the wrong person, and everything Connor’s spent years building can disappear overnight. He follows the rules, keeps his head down, and tries very hard not to think too deeply about the parts of himself that have always been easier to ignore.

Then he meets Cillian Shawe. Connor wants him, and wanting him is dangerous.

Cillian is sharp-tongued, impossible to intimidate, and entirely too good at seeing every secret Connor’s trying to keep buried. What begins as stolen hours and late nights hidden from the rest of the world slowly becomes something Connor can’t keep separate from the rest of his life anymore.

When pressure from the system begins closing in, Connor makes the only choice that feels survivable: protect the uniform, protect his future, and bury the one thing that ever made him want something different.

Some loves survive silence. Some loves survive the lies you tell to keep them alive. But some don’t survive the man you become to keep the truth hidden.

Leave Me Behind is a military romance with dark themes about repression, secrecy, and falling in love in a system built to destroy people for it, where survival often means becoming somebody capable of betraying the things they love most.