That’s all.
No argument. No sharp little question. No bite.
Too tired for that.
Or maybe smart enough not to do it now.
Either way, I don’t explain further. I don’t tell her it’s strategy. Don’t tell her the compound makes me look stronger, steadier, harder to challenge. Don’t tell her no one will dig too deep into her if I put her exactly where I want her and dare them to question it.
She doesn’t need that truth.
Not tonight.
I keep walking.
She comes with me quiet, her body lagging by fractions every few steps like everything in her hurts and she’s too stubborn to say it. I can feel it in the way her hand tenses under mine. In the careful set of her shoulders. In the slight drag when she missteps and corrects too fast.
Gabriel put those hesitations in her.
Gabriel put his hands on her face. On her wrists. On what belongs to me.
The thought enrages me so much I nearly stop walking.
He’ll die.
Just not before I finish this. I take her into the bedroom and shut the door behind us.
The lock turns with one sharp click.
The sound lands exactly how I knew it would.
Her breath catches. Small. Quick.
But I hear it.
Her whole body goes still for one rotten second, and when I look at her, I know exactly what she’s doing.
Bracing.
It’s not obvious and that makes it worse.
It’s the kind of stillness that says she’s already measuring what hurts least. The kind that comes from knowing men who close doors before they break things.
Something vicious moves low in my chest.
I cross the room and catch her chin. Just enough to make her look at me.
Her eyes lift to mine, wide and tired and still too guarded to be anything but honest.
“You can stop doing that.”
Her brows pull together faintly. “Doing what?”
“Bracing like I’m about to put my hands on you wrong.”
The words come out flatter than I mean them to.
Her throat works once. She doesn’t answer.
