Can’t un-ring that bell.
She stirs against me and her hand tightens briefly around mine, like she’s checking I’m still here.
“Hanging in there?” I ask quietly.
“Yeah.” Her voice is raw. “Just thinking.”
“About?”
She’s quiet for a moment. Then, “About how much time we wasted.”
The words hit hard.
Because she’s right.
Five years of circling each other from a distance.
Five years of me punishing myself while she built a life that didn’t include me.
All because I chose silence.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “For not telling you sooner. I just... wanted to leave you alone. Felt... I’d done enough damage.”
She lifts her head. I can’t see her face clearly in the dim light, but I feel her eyes on me.
“You were protecting Leena,” she says. “And me. In your own fucked up way.”
“Still hurt you.”
“Yeah.” She doesn’t sugarcoat it. “You did.”
Then she leans back against me, and I’m not whether to interpret that as forgiveness or something else.
A knock comes at the door.
Amara and I break apart instantly. She shifts to the opposite end of the futon. I straighten, running a hand through my hair like that’ll somehow make us look less like two people who were just wrapped around each other.
“Come in,” I say quickly. Too quickly.
The door opens. It’s Keon.
If he notices our guilty looks, he doesn’t show it.
Professional to the core.
“The storm has let up slightly for the past half hour,” he says. “Parking lot has drained enough to leave. I checked the roads... they’re passable. We should move now before the next band hits.”
I glance at my watch. Eight at night. Then I look at Amara. She’s sitting on the corner of the futon. There are shadows under her eyes that make me want to cross back to her and pull her close again.
But that’s not how this works.
She’s my employee.
We have a contract.
Rules we agreed to.
Rules we’ve been breaking for the last three hours.
