Livia found Dante waiting outside the agency at the end of a day built entirely from sharp edges.
The sky had turned the color of dirty steel. Rain threatened but did not fall, hanging above the city the way unsaid things hung between people who had hurt each other. The agency's front doors opened onto a narrow sidewalk crowded with employees rushing toward buses, delivery bikes cutting too close to the curb, and office workers hiding behind umbrellas they did not yet need.
Dante stood near the black car at the corner, hands in his coat pockets, no driver visible, no assistant to soften him into something less dangerous. He looked like an answer that had been waiting too long.
Livia stopped on the last step.
Her first instinct was to turn around.
Her second was to keep walking, becaus
