What to do?

KAEL

I didn't move right away.

I couldn't.

The door shut behind her with a definitive click, the sound echoing in my skull like a gunshot. She left. Just like that. No glance back. No hesitation. She walked away from me, dragged Sarah with her, and left me standing in the ruins of a moment I hadn't even seen coming.

I stayed still. For a minute. Two.

Trying to process what the fuck just happened.

But my brain was a maze and every turn led to a wall. Her words still rang sharp in my ears, every syllable like glass catching light, cutting deeper the more I looked at them.

"There's nothing between us except sex and a contract."

Bullseye.

I'd taken bullets before. Real ones. Hot, splitting, flesh-tearing things that made men drop to their knees. But that? That fucking line?

That one went deeper.

Because it was her. Aria.

And because maybe it was true.