I close my eyes and try to find stillness. Try to forget the paper. The question. The way Damien looked at me like he already knew the answer.
Sleep doesn’t come. Only the quiet. Only the hum. Only the echo of something I shouldn’t remember—soft, distant, reverent. A voice that doesn’t belong here.
Little lamb.
CHAPTER THIRTY EIGHT
DAMIEN
She’s quieter today.
Not in the way she used to be—curled in on herself, flinching at her own shadow.
This is different.
Measured.
Like she’s rehearsing normal.
She moved through the apartment this morning like she was performing a scene from a script she only half-remembered. Coffee. Shower. A question about groceries. Her voice too even. Her smile too still.
But her eyes?
Her eyes won’t stay on mine for more than three seconds at a time.
And I know her.
She looks away only when she’s keeping something in.
The silence stretches between us like it’s trying to say something neither of us will.
She’s sitting on the couch now, pretending to scroll. I can see the screen from here. It’s off. Black. Just a reflection of her own face staring back at her.
I turn back to the monitors.
But I don’t watch her through the cameras.
I watch her through the glass on the far side of the room.
Live.
Unfiltered.
I want to say something. I want to ask.
But I won’t.
Because whatever she’s holding—it’s not ready to surface.
And I’m not sure I want to see what’s underneath.
So, I do what I’ve always done when I feel the edge creeping in.
I catalog.
1. Note delivered without breach record.
