Silence. Thick. Absolute.
They believed me. As they should. Because I wasn’t bluffing. And they could see it.
"You're threatening us?" Robert's face was going red under his spray tan, that particular shade of entitled fury when someone doesn't bow to their authority. "I'll have your badge?—"
I took one step toward him. Just one. He scrambled backward so fast he knocked over a glass sculpture that probably cost more than my truck.
"I'm taking her home." My voice was flat, final. "Get out of my way."
They scattered like roaches when the lights come on, designer shoes clicking on marble as they backed away.
The hallway stretched before me, more modern art—abstract pieces that looked like someone had thrown paint at canvas and called it genius. Photos of Stephy with various celebrities—all smiling those fake Hollywood smiles, all part of the machine thathad failed to protect her. At the end, her bedroom door—closed but not locked.
I knocked soft. "Stephy? It's me. It's Lee."
Silence. Then footsteps—slow, uneven, like she was hurt. The lock clicked, and the door opened just a crack.
"Lee?" Her voice was so small, so broken.
"Yeah, sweetheart. It's me."
The door opened wider, and I saw her.
Jesus Christ.
She looked like a bird whose wings had been clipped. Standing there in pajamas that were too big—men's pajamas, I realized with a jolt, ones she'd stolen from my bag that Christmas three years ago. Her hair was tangled and matted, pieces sticking to her face where tears had dried. Mascara and eyeliner streaked down her cheeks in black rivers.
There were bruises already forming on her arms, dark fingerprints against her pale skin. A cut on her lip, blood dried at the corner. Her left eye was starting to swell, purple spreading across her cheekbone like spilled wine. She was holding her ribs with one arm, and she swayed slightly, like standing was taking everything she had.
But it was her eyes that nearly broke me. Empty. Hollow. That thousand-yard stare I'd seen in victims of the worst kinds of violence. My Stephy, who'd always burned so bright, looked extinguished.
The words came out before I could stop them. Shredded and loaded with the ache of my crumbling heart. "Oh, baby.”
She shattered.
Her knees buckled, and I caught her before she hit the floor, gathering her into my arms as she broke apart completely. Not dramatic sobs, but these quiet, devastating sounds like something inside her was tearing. Her fingers clawed at my shirt, trying to get closer, trying to disappear into me.
"I've got you," I whispered into her hair, holding her as tight as I dared with her injuries. "You're safe now. I’m here."
I could feel her ribs under my hands, the way she flinched when I touched her left side. The swelling in her wrists. The trembling that wouldn't stop. My vision went red at the edges, fury so pure it was almost holy. Someone had done this to her. Someone had hurt my Stephy, and they were still breathing.
Later. I'd deal with that later.
"Can you walk?"
She shook her head against my chest, and I realized she was barefoot, her feet cut up like she'd run across broken glass. The lamp. She'd fought hard enough to break the lamp.
"I'm going to carry you out, okay? We're leaving right now."
"My things?—"
"Don't need them." I pulled back enough to look at her face, my hands gentle as they framed it, thumb carefully avoiding the cut on her lip. "We're getting you out of here. That's all that matters."
She nodded, trusting me completely, and something in my chest cracked wide open.
I found a blanket on her bed—soft cashmere in cream, the kind of unnecessary luxury that defined this whole world—and wrapped it around her. Then I lifted her into my arms, her weight nothing, her body curling into my chest like she was trying to make herself smaller, invisible.
Her room told the story of the fight—the broken lamp, makeup brushes scattered like evidence, a mirror with a crack spider-webbing from the corner where something had hit it. Blood on the white carpet. She'd fought hard. My girl had fought.
