The silence stretched between them like a wound that neither of them knew how to close.
Mia didn't move. She stood with her back against the counter, arms folded across her chest — not defensively, but like she was holding herself together through the deliberate application of pressure.
Waiting.
The phone sat dark on the table between them, the caller's voice already fading into the kind of memory that leaves a mark before you've had time to prepare for it.
Leo was still staring at the screen.
She had learned, in the days since he'd reappeared in her life, to read the architecture of his composure. The way his jaw set when he was processing something he didn't want to show.
The way his eyes went very still when he was thinking hard and fast beneath a controlled surface.
She had c
