Silver Forked Tongues.

GALWAY DISTRICT; THE QUAY STREET KITCHEN; GALWAY IN IRELAND… THE HIGHEST FLOOR...THE ONLY PRIVATE ROOM.

The private dining room was an opulent nest perched atop the Quay Street Kitchen, far above the chatter and clinking glasses of the general public. Dimly lit with golden pendant lights and lined with dark wood and wine-colored velvet, it exhaled wealth and privacy.

Candles flickered on a polished oak table set for two, a chilled bottle of Chablis breathing quietly beside crystal glasses. The panoramic window displayed the Galway skyline, bathed in the final embers of twilight.

Tyra sat at the head of the crystal, intimate table, her shoulders squared, jaw clenched, eyes fixed on the wine glass she hadn't touched. Her dress, a creamy, pale, silken slip of iridescent fabric, caught the candlelight in waves. The setting was perfect, but she was far from at ease.

Across from her, Ryan Adams draped himself leisurely in the chair like he belonged there...like he belonged anywhere he decided to be. He wore that insufferably smug grin, the kind she'd come to know too well on set. His shirt was half-buttoned, his sleeves pushed up his forearms, casual in a way that felt entirely too deliberate.

"You didn't even look surprised to see me," he said, swirling the wine in his glass.

Tyra raised her eyes, cold and deliberate. "I don't waste emotions where they're not needed."

Ryan chuckled, leaning forward on his elbows. "That would be a damn shame, considering how expressive you usually are."

Her spine stiffened.

He noticed.

She hated that he noticed.

He smirked at her suddenly stiffness, his eyes locked on hers. "Why are you so nervous around me, Tyra?"

Her fingers went down to the hem of her dress and squeezed it hard. "I'm not nervous." Hse defuted.

"You flinch when I talk."

"No, I grimace."

"You avoid looking me in the eye."

"Because your eyes are annoying."

"You always have a snappy comeback."

"And you always overstay your welcome."

A beat of silence.

Both of them having raspy breaths.

Tyra suddenly scoffed while shooting him a sharp look. "What do you want, Ryan?"

"To eat," he replied shruggedly, removing his elbows from the table,while leaning back to his seat. "You were heading to dinner. I was hungry. It felt like... fate."

"More like a stalker with good taste in elevators."

"Ouch." He gave a low chuckle, unbothered.

Tyra scoffed angrily before reaching for her menu, pretending to study it even though she had memorized it already. Anything to keep her eyes off him, off the memory of the elevator, off the night her brain insisted on deleting while her body seemed determined to recall.

Ryan kept watching her, like he could read through the page and into her bloodstream.

"Do you always eat alone in the most private room of every restaurant you visit? Or is this just a special occasion?"

"Do you always stalk your co workers or is this just a delusional episode?"

Ryan raised a brow. "Stalk? Come on, you act like I climbed up the balcony with a rose in my mouth. I walked into a public elevator."

"You followed me."

"Maybe I did. Maybe I just wanted to eat with someone whose company I enjoy. God forbid." He rolled his eyes.

She scoffed. "You don't enjoy anything unless it strokes your ego."

The waiter arrived before he could answer, placing a basket of artisan bread and two small bowls of truffle butter on the table. Tyra offered a terse nod, Ryan a practiced smile. Once alone again, she buttered a piece of bread with robotic precision.

"Let me guess," Ryan said. "You'll order the grilled sea bass. It's got that restrained, elegant quality. Like you, Predictably refined."

Tyra didn't glance up. "And you'll go for the lamb. Bloody, indulgent, with zero subtlety, Just like you."

He laughed outright. "Damn, we know each other too well."

"Not nearly enough."

A second passed again.

"Is that what bothers you? That we don't? Or that we might?"

She finally looked up, her gaze icy but steady. "What bothers me is that you think everything is a game."

"It isn't?"

"Not to me."

The tension between them thickened, coiling through the low-lit space like a third guest at the table.

Ryan leaned back, his fingers tapping against his wine glass. "You were different on set today... Nervous...Defensive...Not like you."

"And you were more irritating than usual. But I chalked that up to the weather."

The waiter returned, took their orders,sea bass and lamb, just as predicted,and poured their wine. As he walked away, Ryan tilted his glass toward her.

"To chance encounters."

She didn't toast. "To missteps." She rolled her eyes.

They drank in silence.

As the food arrived, the tension remained, stitched beneath every forkful and glance. Tyra barely touched her bass, her appetite soured by the weight of his presence and the labyrinth of thoughts he awakened.

Ryan, however, ate like he was devouring a triumph, slicing through his lamb with slow satisfaction, lips curling at every chew.

"You really regret being here, don't you?" he asked after a long, thoughtful bite.

Tyra put down her fork and met his gaze with chilling precision. "Not being here. Just being here with you."

He stared at her for a long time.

"You know," he said slowly, voice lower now, "for someone who wants to forget, you sure don't stop remembering."

That was too close. Too sharp.

She pushed her plate away, her appetite extinguished.

"And for someone who wants answers, you ask all the wrong questions."

He didn't answer immediately. Then he leaned in, elbows on the table, expression unreadable.

"Alright then, Tyra. Let's not ask. Let's just sit here. In silence. Pretending this dinner isn't crackling like a live wire. Pretending you don't flinch every time I speak. Pretending you didn't look at me in that elevator like I was the last person on earth you wanted to see. Or the first."

Tyra rose from her seat.

"Thanks for the dinner. I won't make the mistake of repeating it."

But Ryan stood too, his voice soft.

"You already did. You're still standing here."

Her heart rattled in her chest.

She hated how right he was. And how wrong she felt for being affected by it.

She turned sharply and left the room, heels clicking with venom. Ryan didn't follow immediately. He simply looked at her half-full wine glass, then at his emptied one, and smiled to himself.

He was satisfied.

She was not.

And the night ended with one full stomach, one unresolved storm, and two people drowning in silence that said too much.