"Which proves my initial point."
I nodded, taking another slow drag, letting the smoke curl between us. "Guess so."
And then, just like that—like it was nothing, like it didn’t carry the weight of everything she’d kept locked away—she said it.
"James smokes cigars."
The air between us shifted. Subtle, but there. And I didn’t miss the effort it took for her to say those words out loud.
"Have you heard from him?" I asked, even though I already knew the answer.
She shook her head. “No, and I don’t think I will. I broke his heart in Switzerland, and he’s stubborn. His walls are too high, I’d be surprised if he contacts me this cycle.”
I exhaled, flicking the cigarette into the dirt before turning to face her fully. “You realize that makes him the biggest idiot in the world, right?”
She shrugged, trying for indifference, but her eyes betrayed her. The hurt—the one she carried so well, so invisibly—I saw it clear as day. And for some reason, it made me start planning James’s murder in meticulous detail.
I stepped in closer, my voice low. “Do you think you could ever forgive him?”
Her focus lifted, searching my face like she was trying to gauge whether I actually wanted the answer or if I was only making conversation.
"For not contacting me?" she asked. "Or for lying the entire time we were together?"
My eyes held hers. “Either.”
She hesitated, the words heavy on her tongue, caught between the safety of silence and the weight of letting them go.
And then, eventually, they spilled out. Slow at first—careful, measured. But once they started, they tumbled forward, a confession she could no longer keep locked inside.
“It’s not just that he kept things from me,” she said, the words soft but laced with pain. “It’s that I didn’t have anyone else. I was so isolated, no family, no friends, no one I could turn to. James was the only constant in my life, the only person who made me feel like I wasn’t completely alone.”
She looked down, her fingers twisting together, as if trying to ground herself.
“I depended on him so much,” she continued, her voice barely above a whisper. “Too much, maybe. So when he—” She stopped, breath catching, her lashes fluttering shut for a moment as she steadied herself.
“When he betrayed me, it wasn’t only about what he did. It was the fact I’d trusted him with everything, and he never gave me the same in return.”
She let out a quiet snort, but the sadness in her features lingered. “He didn’t even tell me his real name.”
I frowned. “What do you mean?”
She exhaled, slow and measured. “When the Council selected him for the Offensive program at age nine, he renamed himself James—after James Bond. Aside from Stephen and Jackson, no one knows what he was born as. Not even me.”
I shook my head. “Damn, the guy takes keeping secrets to an Olympic level."
Her throat bobbed as she swallowed. “Yes, and in keeping his secrets, he also tried to keep me small, too. Tried to contain my powers, my personal growth. And realizing that…” She took in another deep breath. “It broke something inside me.”
Her voice trembled, and she pressed her lips together, willing herself not to fall apart after her own admission.
Fuck me. This waswayout of my depth. My chest tightened at the rawness in her voice, and I had no idea what to say. So, of course, I went for the first thing coming to mind—a fucking platitude. “Communication is key.”
Really Colt?Communication is key?
The laugh she let out while I was mentally kicking myself was dry, almost bitter, but it didn’t erase the hurt etched into her face. “Ah, yes. Which is pretty much where we crashed and burned.”
I tilted my head, studying her, trying to piece together what she wasn’t saying. “Why’s that?”
She sighed, the kind of deep, heavy sigh, coming from a place of defeat. “I think we couldn’t see past our own pain to recognize the one the other bore. I didn’t even try at first. After we got together, I wanted to fix it—Gods, I tried—but… well…” She hesitated, biting her bottom lip. “I’m also a little stubborn.”
