Lucian.
Standing there like a statue. His gaze locked onto Rohi with a hollowness that punches the breath from my lungs.
Because I recognize it.
That look.
That vacant, aching stare.
It mirrors mine.
He’s my torment, made flesh.
I see the moment it hits him—that awful realization that he’s probably lost her.
And something inside him... crumples.
I want to tell him he hasn’t. That he still has a chance.
That the woman he loves is standing right in front of him. Still breathing. Stillreachable.
Mine isn’t.
Lucian drops his gaze almost instantly. Doesn’t fight. Doesn’t plead. Just takes a few unsteady steps toward us, clutching the paper bag I recognize—thesherwaniI lent him earlier.
His hands are trembling.
God.
He looks broken in the same way I feel. In the way only men who’ve loved wrong—too late, too blindly—can ever be broken.
I glance at Rohi. She’s frozen. Just... staring at him.
This moment wasn’t meant for me.
None of it was.
I shouldn’t be in this scene. I shouldn’t be here. I never should’ve been in the middle of this.
Guilt blooms sharp and fast when Lucian speaks.
“Thesherwani,” he whispers, voice barely holding itself together.
I snap out of it. Step forward to take the bag from his hands.
Our fingers brush.
I want him to look up. To see that I get it. That I understand the pain sitting just beneath his skin. That he’s not alone in it. That he still has a chance to make it right. That I haven’t taken it from him. Iwon’t.
Maybe even see that in Rohi’s eyes too.
He just has to look up.
But he doesn’t.
His gaze never lifts.
And maybe that’s the worst part—
