Nellie’s POV
The journey began in silence—the kind of silence that doesn’t come from peace, but from everything left unsaid.
Ethan drove with exaggerated focus, his fingers gripping the steering wheel until his knuckles turned white. The road wound through fog-covered mountains, the truck moving like a weary beast beneath a slate-gray sky.
The engine’s hum was hypnotic. I stared out the window, watching the world pass by, trying not to think about anything. But it was impossible.
I thought of Serena.
I thought of Caleb.
And, most of all, I thought of the man sitting beside me.
Ethan hadn’t changed as much as I’d expected. He still carried that restrained air—that strange mix of authority and melancholy. But now there was something else: a shadow in his eyes, a hardness that hadn’t b
