The security vault door shut behind me with a finality that rattled in my bones.
I hadn’t deleted the footage.
Not yet.
I couldn’t bring myself to destroy the only proof of how far I’d already fallen.
But I had paused the recordings.
An hour, maybe less. Just enough time for Asher to pull his strings and me to pretend I hadn’t seen a thing.
That alone made me complicit.
And he knew it.
⸻
When I stepped into the therapy room again, Asher didn’t rise to greet me.
He was seated, legs sprawled, wrists still bound loosely in front of him.
But he didn’t look restrained.
He looked like a king on a throne, bored with the chaos he’d already unleashed.
His gaze lifted lazily when I entered.
“I expected you sooner.”
“I almost didn’t come,” I said, voice raw. “But you knew I would.”
A
