Jax hadn’t moved in ten minutes.
The kitchen was still, dim except for the soft buzz of the overhead light. He leaned against the counter, arms braced, staring at the scar in the laminate as if it held answers.
It didn’t.
Nothing did.
She didn’t hate him.
She wanted to.
That landed harder than any punch he’d ever taken.
He’d spent years telling himself she was better off—safer, without him. But the woman standing across from him in that hoodie—his hoodie—wasn’t safer. She was unraveling. Quietly. Alone. And it gutted him that he’d been too blind to see it before.
Jax scrubbed a hand down his face. The tension between them burned in his muscles, a low thrum of unsaid things and unresolved history. She didn’t flinch when he got close—but she didn’t soften either.
She was keeping him
