I press my forehead to the cool wood. “Shut up.”
She laughs again. God, she laughs. “It’s not,” she continues. “It’s about you realising you don’t get to be the centre of my gravity anymore.”
Something fractures behind my eyes. “I saved you,” I say, the words sounding like a plea. “I kept you alive.”
“You did,” she agrees. “And I’m grateful.”
Silence drops between us, heavy and expectant. Then—soft, lethal—“But I don’t belong to gratitude.”
I slam my fist into the wall beside the door. The sound echoes through the empty hallway, ugly and raw. “You don’t care,” I say, the rage bubbling up. “After everything?—”
“Oh, I care,” she replies. “Just not about being owned.”
I hear her footsteps approach the other side of the door. Her shadow slides beneath it, a thin dark line on the carpet. “You can lock every door in this house,” she says lightly. “You can chain the windows. You can sit outside all night pretending you’re protecting me.” She taps the door once, exactly where my knuckles still ache. “But you already lost.”
My breath stutters.
“Because,” she adds, the smile audible in her voice, “I walked into a place that taught me how to disappear—and walked out without you.”
The words rip something open I can’t close. I slide down the door until I’m sitting on the floor, back against the wood that separates us, my hands shaking and my mind racing in tight, violent circles. Inside the room, she hums again. Cheerful. Unbothered. Free. And for the first time since I met her, I understand the truth I’ve been refusing to see. I didn’t lock her in to keep her safe. I locked her in because I’m terrified of what happens if she doesn’t need me to survive anymore.
The humming stops.
That’s what finally breaks me. I don’t realise how much I was clinging to that sound—her careless little tune, her proof of indifference—until it cuts off so cleanly it feels deliberate. Silence snaps tight around my skull. The kind that presses. The kind that demands something from you. I get to my feet, slowly,my hands shaking now. Not with fear. With rage so sharp it feels surgical. Precise. Like every thought in my head has narrowed down to one brutal certainty.
She thinks she’s won.
I unlock the door. The click is loud in the quiet hallway. Final. Unavoidable. I don’t open it yet. I rest my palm flat against the wood, breathing through my nose, counting—not to calm down, but to make sure I don’t tear the hinges off and prove her right about me being nothing but impulse and teeth.
“You done performing?” I ask.
On the other side, her voice is soft. Curious. Unafraid. “Took you long enough.”
That does it. I open the door. She’s standing in the middle of the room, not backed into a corner like she should be, not defensive, not waiting for permission. Her posture is loose, almost lazy, like she’s been expecting me. Like she arranged herself this way on purpose. Her eyes flick over me. Slow. Assessing. That smile curves again—not sweet, not taunting—knowing.
“You look wrecked,” she says. “Is this the part where you pretend I made you do this?”
I cross the room in three steps. I don’t grab her. I don’t have to. The air shifts when I stop in front of her, close enough that she has to tilt her head back to meet my eyes. Close enough that she can feel how tightly I’m holding myself together. “You don’t get to provoke me and then pretend you’re not affected by the outcome,” I say.
She lifts her chin. “Who said I wasn’t affected?”
That’s the crack. I see it then—not fear, not submission—excitement. Bright and sharp and utterly unforgivable. She wants this collision. Wants to feel me lose control while she stays untouched by it. I cup her jaw. Firm. Claiming. Her breath stutters. There it is.
“Don’t confuse my restraint for mercy,” I murmur. “I am still very capable of ruining you.”
Her lips part in a smile that shouldn’t exist. “Then do it,” she whispers. “Or admit you’re scared I won’t break the way you need me to.”
My vision goes red. I crowd her back until she hits the wall—not slammed, not hurt—pinned. The power shift snaps into place like muscle memory. Her pulse jumps under my thumb. I feel it. She feels me feel it. “You think you’re free,” I say lowly. “You think because you stood in that room you rewrote the rules.”
She exhales, slow and deliberate, eyes never leaving mine. “No,” she says. “I rewrote you.”
That’s when I kiss her. Not soft. Not tender. Not asking. It’s anger and want and possession crashing into her mouth all at once—a kiss meant to shut her up, to remind her what gravity feels like when it drags instead of invites. She gasps, fingers curling into my shirt like she expected this and prepared for it. That makes me furious all over again. I pull back just enough to look at her. She’s smiling. Breathing hard. Alive.
“You still think locking doors makes you dangerous?” she asks quietly. “Because right now you’re just loud.”
I press my forehead to hers, teeth clenched. “You don’t get to mock the man who would burn the world for you.”
She laughs under her breath. “I don’t need a world burned,” she says. “I need you honest.”
