I swallowed. The steam made everything blurry. Or maybe that was me.
He stepped back. Water slapping off his shoulders, hands dragging through his wet hair.
“Don’t lie to me again.”
It wasn’t a threat. It was a plea. I nodded. “I won’t.”
He stepped forward. Took my face in his hands. Pressed his forehead to mine.
The water made it hard to hear. But I caught it. The breath. The tremble. The thing Wolfe never gave away. “Don’t leave me quiet.”
I froze. Because he didn’t mean noise. He meant presence. He meant stay.
I wrapped my arms around his waist. Held him as tight as I could. Felt his hands flatten against my back.
The water cooled.
Still we stood there. No chains. No leash. No commands. Just breath.
And the man who once touched me like a sentence now held me like a prayer. And I would stay. Not because he pulled the leash?—
But because I still remembered how to breathe when he touched me.
And nothing else had ever felt more like home.
24
BARRON
The news feedwas on mute.
I didn’t need sound to cut.
The image was enough.
Selene, outside the federal building. Wrapped in winter silk and soft gold. A navy coat pulled tight around her waist. Hair perfect. Skin luminous. A crucifix at her throat like salvation had always been hers to wield.
She didn’t flinch at the cameras. She smiled at them. The chyron at the bottom of the screen read:
SELENE LAWLOR: Whistleblower in Federal Probe of Diamond Empire
Whistleblower.
I leaned back in my chair.
Didn’t blink.
Didn’t breathe hard.
Just watched.
The office around me didn’t move either. It was too quiet. The kind of stillness that makes noise feel like an insult. The air smelled like old paper, sharp ink, expensive leather. The windows were tinted, the light gray and indifferent.
The bourbon glass on the desk had gone untouched since last night, condensation trailing a single path toward a file I hadn’t read.
The blinds were drawn, but light still bled through. Casting long, slatted shadows across the rug Selene picked out. The one she insisted tied the room together.
Every fucking thing in here she touched. Someone handed her a mic. She accepted it like a queen taking communion. The reporters swarmed. Then one voice rose—clear, firm. Female.
