My lungs seize. I don't move.
He lifts one brow. There is no heat in the look, only expectation and contempt held in careful balance.
"Or do we draw the line here," he says, "after all those principles and twenty-five thousand in actual cash?"
The humiliation is so complete it makes my skin feel too tight. I step toward him again because the alternative is walking out without the money and without any way to fix what keeps my parents awake at night.
My hands feel numb as I lift them to the buttons down his shirtfront.
The first comes undone more easily than I expect. The soft pop sounds too loud in the quiet room. Fabric parts a fraction, revealing a sliver of warm skin and the sharp line of his collarbone.
My throat tightens. I tell myself not to look. My eyes flicker there anyway.
