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Her gaze lifts again.
Meets mine.
And this time—
There’s no distance.
No pullback.
Just clarity.
“We flush it out,” she says.
“Yeah.”
“How?”
I don’t answer right away.
Because I’m already thinking.
Already building it.
Not just protection.
Strategy.
Control.
“We don’t change anything,” I say finally.
Her brow furrows slightly.
“What?”
“We stay exactly like this,” I continue. “Same proximity. Same communication. Same patterns.”
Understanding hits her fast.
“You want him to keep watching,” she says.
“I want him to think he understands what he’s seeing.”
A beat.
“Then we change one thing.”
Her eyes narrow slightly.
“Which is?”
I hold her gaze.
“Timing.”
That lands.
Because she knows exactly what that means.
