I couldn’t breathe.
“Braila,” he said, his hands gripping my shoulders. “Are you okay? Braila.”
When I said Ren was my partner in crime.
“Braila.”
I lied.
“Hey! Can you hear me?”
My heart pounded like it was about to explode. Each breath I took burned like sharp glass in my throat. I heard Ren calling my name over and over, but it sounded far away—like he was shouting through water.
I couldn’t answer. I couldn’t even move. My ears rang with the sound of my heartbeat, loud enough to drown out everything else. My vision blurred. Panic twisted inside me like a rope tightening around my chest. All the fantasies I’d built—the idea that Ren and I were something—broke apart in an instant. Everything I believed in shattered like glass. My throat tightened, and suddenly, a scream r
