ALEXANDER
Faye’s answer hit me like a slow, steady weight. Yes. Just a single word—simple, unadorned—but the meaning behind it was anything but simple.
I stood there for a moment, still holding her hand, trying to process what she had just admitted. My mind was spinning. I wanted to ask questions, to demand answers, but I couldn’t. Not yet. Not when she looked like this.
I glanced down at her, scanning for bruises, scratches—anything that suggested the toll of taking down Patrick. But she was clean. Not a single mark. Her hair fell in place as though nothing had happened, her skin smooth, her eyes level and clear.
She radiated a kind of quiet assurance that both unnerved and, strangely, fascinated me. I was staring at her, trying to reconcile the Faye I knew—the Faye I loved—with the F
