The air in the dimly lit room is thick with tension, the faint hum of the party muffled beyond the closed door. My heart pounds, a frantic drumbeat, as I grip Oliver’s wrist, my fingers trembling against the heat of his skin. His raised hand hovers, frozen mid-air, his eyes squeezed shut in a moment of barely contained rage. Roberta’s venomous words still echo—“You hurt her because you wanted to”—and I feel them like a knife twisting in my chest. She’s gone now, her heels clacking in retreat, but the space she left behind feels like a void, heavy with the weight of what I just witnessed.
“Would you have done it?” I whisper, my voice shaking, a mix of fear and disbelief. My eyes search his, wide and raw, as I try to reconcile the man before me with the one who’s kept me at arm’s length for
