"I want them dismantled. Every asset, every employee, every fucking brick of their operation—gone. Let the entire industry see what happens when someone comes after my family."
"Nick." Avery's on her feet now, crossing toward me. The flush climbing her throat, the way her eyes flash, part challenge, part dread, that pulls at me even now. "That will keep us in headlinesfor months. Every filing, every court date… we become the story."
"Good."
"It's not good," she says gently. "The article is already out there. The damage is done. If we ignore this story, it may die in a week. Your plan keeps it alive indefinitely."
"And yours lets them continue to profit from hurting you without any cost at all."
A small furrow knits her forehead. "They didn't lie, Nick. They took the truth and twisted it. That's not the same thing."
"What about the implication that you used me to get ahead? That everything between us is transaction?" My jaw aches from clenching. "That's a fucking insult to both of us. To the career you've built."
"Then let me defend my career."
She holds my gaze, standing her ground in my space the way few others would dare. I love that about her, the fierceness within her. The strength. Right now, it’s only making me dig my heels in harder.
"Rachel and I can draft a statement,” she says. “I'll talk about my Mom's strength, her redemption—"
"No statements."
She exhales, her mouth flattening. "An interview, then. With a real news outlet. I can let the public see me as the artist I am, independent of you—"
"No interviews."
"Nick." Her hand closes around my wrist, and the contact jolts through me, her fingers warm against my pulse point, her thumb pressing into the tender skin where scar tissue meets unmarked flesh. For a moment, one dangerous moment, I almost yield. Her touch has always undone me. The way she looks at me now, pleading and fierce and so goddamn brave.
My throat tightens. I can feel myself wavering, feel the rigid certainty starting to crack.
I force myself to consider her argument. But then I think about what comes next. The follow-up stories. The deeper digs. The reporters who'll keep circling until they find the rest of it—my past, my scars, the darkness I've spent a lifetime burying.
The fear closes over me like cold water.
"We're not dignifying their hit piece with any kind of response." I pull my wrist free, and hurt flickers across her face. "I want them annihilated. End of discussion."
"And their employees?" She frowns at me, as if she’s seeing someone she doesn’t fully recognize. "The ones who had nothing to do with this article? There must be hundreds of people working at Rennick Media. Do you really want to destroy their livelihoods to punish one ambitious reporter?"
I lift a shoulder. "Collateral damage. Rennick knew the risk."
"That's not justice, Nick." Her voice has gone quiet now, a tone that’s far worse than if she’d shouted. "That's cruelty."
The word lands like a slap. Because she’s not wrong. Yet it doesn’t change my mind.
I can feel the moment balanced on a knife's edge, can feel her waiting for me to step back from the precipice. But I can’t do that. Not even for her.
"Nobody hurts what's mine.Ever."
"Please." She steps closer, and her hand finds my arm again, her touch gentle despite everything. "Just wait a few days. Let’s find a better way to do this. Together, as partners. Don't do something in anger that can't be undone."
I look down at her hand on my arm. At her face, open and pleading. At this woman I love more than my own survival, asking me to be better than I am.
The silence stretches. I watch her hope build in the pause, watch her think she's reaching me.
"Nick." Softer now. "I know you're scared. I know this feels like the only way to protect us. But destroying them won't make us safer. It just makes us people who destroy things."
She's right.
I know she's right.
