He stepped forward and his face was close enough that she could see the small flecks of salt that the wind had caught in his lashes. “Scars are part of stories,” he said. “They make people interesting. They make them stay.”
Maylen felt the ache of that—his want to keep her not because of love but because the story fit him. She thought of the gala, the shell, the staged photos. She thought of the slow architecture of her revenge. She thought of how thin the line was between making him suffer and giving herself permission to feel again.
A sudden sound cut the moment—the soft click that might have been a camera shutter or a footstep on wet wood. Lanry’s eyes darted to the end of the pier. For a second his whole posture changed: alert, protective, the animal surfacing under the human skin.
