He’d said it with so much vigor, I realized just how badly he wanted me gone. He didn’t care about himself. He didn’t care about the research either. He didn’t want me hurt. And I didn’t want him hurt.
I took a shaky breath and stood up with my hands on the table. “Okay.” Ausmane’s icy eyes lifted. “I’ll do that, so don’t yell at me.” My throat pinged with hurt, but I couldn’t show a single hint of it to him. “For the record, you don’t know me either. But it doesn’t matter. We’re going our own ways soon.”
Leaving him always felt incomplete, but what was there to complete?
I headed for the doors. “Let’s go back. I’m starving.”
The banquet hall was noisy and full. People had finished their entrees and had risen to talk to other tables, posh dresses, luxurious suits, drinking wine, laughi
