- Luca
The silence fell into the room.
Aria’s fingers relaxed just enough to stop fighting mine.
Her gaze dropped to our hands, tangled around the folder, a fragile truce neither of us had agreed to but were too tired to break.
“You’re planning for me to walk away,” she whispered. "You know I always want to sever our bond in the first place."
“No.”
She looked up.
“Not for you to walk away,” I said. “For you to have the choice. There’s a difference.”
Something flickered in her eyes. She looked hurt for a second, then lost, before she finally slammed that old wall of defiance back up between us.
She slowly pulled her hands away, but left the folder on the bed.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked. “About all this.”
I hesitated.
“Would you have believed me
