The realization settles over her face. The slow, awful understanding of who I am and what I’ve done. Her breath catches, and her eyes don’t move.
She’s looking at me, seeing both the man who saved her and the monster she’s been warned about her entire career.
I see it hit her.
And it sinks into me too.
“I understand what you have to do next.” I take a step toward her, hands open, careful. “I’ll never hurt you, Laurette. All I’ve ever wanted is to keep you safe.”
She stays still, but her eyes flicker. Fear?
Maybe.
Probably.
I reach for her anyway, because this is the last time I’ll ever get to. She lets me pull her against my chest, trembling, her cheek pressed to me like she’s trying to memorize the shape of this moment before it’s gone.
And it is.
It already is.
“This is goodbye,” I whisper into her hair.
Her fingers clutch at my shirt, the faintest shake betraying everything she doesn’t say. I close my eyes and inhale the scent of her skin, the warmth of her breath, the weight of her falling apart in my arms.
The words come out rough, unplanned. “Something is happening to me.”
I shake my head once, hoping that might steady it.
“I didn’t think I was built for this… for wanting someone the way I want you.”
My voice lowers, quieter, honest in a way that costs me. “I think I’m falling in love with you, Babygirl. At least that’s what it feels like. Or perhaps I’m already there and just refusing to call it what it is.” A breath. “At the very least, I’m obsessed with you. And that’s never happened before. I’ve never felt this way about anyone.”
I look at her, studying her.
“You’re the one I never saw coming.”
I press my lips to the top of her head because I couldn’t bear it if she turned away from my kiss.
My hand slides down her back, slow, savoring. “I’ll remember every moment we’ve shared. Every second.”
I hold her one last time, letting the ache sink bone-deep.
Letting her go tears at me from the inside, but I do it. Slowly. Carefully. Too sudden a motion, and the fragile connection between us could snap.
Her fingers slip from mine, and her breath catches. I force my hands to fall away from her.
One step back. Another. Then I turn toward the doorway.
I don’t glance back over my shoulder. I can’t. If I see her face—see even the smallest flicker asking me to stay—I won’t leave. And staying will ruin us both.
So I walk.
My mind shifts into a mode I hoped I’d never need. Five years of preparation snap into place like pieces of a weapon reassembling themselves.
Shut it all down. Cut every tie. Disappear before sunrise.
A new name and a new city. A man with no traceable past.
