"I believe you." She cuts me off without looking at me. "I believe you didn't know your past would come back like this. I believe you thought the debt to my father was a simple transaction that would never touch your real life."
"Then what?—"
"But that doesn't change the reality." Now she does look at me, and I see the pain beneath the control. "You're not just a man who owes my father a favor. You're a man with enemies of your own. Enemies sophisticated enough to track me here, to send professional killers, to connect dots that should have stayed disconnected."
"I can protect you from them."
"You almost died protecting me this morning." Her voice cracks on the last word. "I watched you come down those stairs covered in blood. I bandaged a bullet wound while you explained that three men were dead because of me."
"Because of both of us."
"Does that make it better?" She turns to face me fully, and I see the tears she's fighting to hold back. "Does sharing the blame make you less injured? Does it bring back the simple life you were living before my father called in his marker?"
"I don't want my simple life back."
"You should." The words are barely a whisper. "Because every moment I stay here, I'm putting you in danger. And every moment you stay with me, you're putting yourself in danger. This thing between us, whatever it is, it's built on circumstances that are actively trying to kill us."
"So what? We walk away? Pretend the last nine days didn't happen?"
"Maybe that's exactly what we should do." She wipes at her eyes with the back of her hand, a quick, angry gesture. "Maybe this was only ever going to be temporary. A boat thing. A proximity thing. Something that feels real because we're trapped together with no other options."
"That's not what this is."
"How do you know?" She's almost shouting now, her composure finally cracking. "How can you possibly know that? Nine days, Ford. We've known each other nine days. That's not enough time to build something real. That's enough time to build something that feels real while bullets are flying and danger is everywhere and we're clinging to each other because there's nothing else to cling to."
I want to reach for her. Want to pull her into my arms and kiss away the doubt and the fear and the very reasonable objections she's raising.
I don't.
Because she's not entirely wrong.
"When I made the deal with Priest," I say slowly, "I knew there would be a price. I knew someone held a marker andsomeday they'd call it in. What I didn't know was that paying my debt would mean dragging someone else into the crossfire."
"You didn't drag me. My father did."
"And if I'd refused? If I'd told Enzo Mancini to find someone else to protect his daughter?"
She's quiet for a moment. "Then I might be dead already. Those men this morning, they would have found me eventually. Somewhere with less protection. Someone who didn't have your training or your instincts."
"So you see?—"
"I see a man who saved my life and almost lost his own in the process." She takes a step back, creating more distance. "I see a situation that's more complicated than either of us understood. And I see two people who let themselves believe in something that might not survive contact with reality."
"Sera—"
"I need time." She holds up a hand again, and I stop moving toward her. "I need space to think about what happens next. Whether I go back to my father's people. Whether I stay here and risk both of us getting killed. Whether there's any version of this where we get out whole."
"What are you saying?"
"I'm saying I can't be with you right now. Not while I'm trying to decide what the rest of my life looks like." The tears are falling freely now, tracking silver lines down her cheeks. "I'm saying that whatever we started on this boat, it needs to pause until I figure out whether I can live with the cost."
The words should hurt more than they do.
Instead, all I feel is a cold certainty settling into my bones.
She's not walking away because she doesn't care. She's walking away because she cares too much. Because she's seen what caring about me costs, and she's not sure the price is worth paying.
"I won't try to stop you." The words feel like broken glass in my throat. "If you want to go to your father's people, I'll arrange the transport myself."
