Chapter 4

The rising sun cut a sharp, bright line across the dusty floor, splitting the warehouse in two—light and dark. Leo and I stood on opposite sides of that line.

I was frozen, my throat tight. "Leo…" His name came out a dry croak.

He tilted his head a little, the move of a predator. His beautiful, empty eyes fixed on me. "You here to beg for him?" He nudged Mark's chair with his boot. The metal legs screeched. Mark whimpered behind the gag, his eyes pleading with me.

"Leo, listen… I'm not on his side," I blurted, the words too fast. "But we can't… we can't just do this. We can't break the law." Even to me, it sounded weak, like something a bystander would say.

"So," he cut in, his voice flat, totally empty of the stormy feelings I was used to, "you are here to beg for him." This Leo was a stranger. Cold. Detached. It was the calm before he broke himself, and it scared me more than any of his rages ever had.

What could I say? That I was collecting evidence? That the drug was for testing? That every cruel word was a lie for the bigger plan? He wouldn't buy it. Any excuse would sound like another layer of the beautiful lie from his dream. The thin string between us was stretched to snapping.

I thought he'd yell. I thought he'd drag me home and tie me up again. This quiet giving up was worse. It felt like sinking in quicksand—slow, silent, and suffocating.

After forever, he sighed. It was a soft, broken sound that seemed to hold all the hurt in the world.

"Lily," he said, and my name in his mouth had never sounded so final. "You know I love you, right?" He wasn't looking at Mark anymore. He was looking only at me, and his eyes were pits of a pain so deep it had iced over. "I'm scared of a lot of things. And every single one is about you. I'm scared you'll get hurt. I'm scared you'll get lost. I'm scared you'll leave me."

He took a step, not toward me, but along that line of light, like he was walking the edge of a cliff. "For days, I've been asking myself… how much do you hate me? Hate me enough to wreck yourself just to get away from me?" He stopped and looked at me, really looked, and what I saw in his face broke me. "Now I know."

His voice cracked, just once, but his expression stayed carved from ice. "I know that even if I hold onto you with everything I've got, you'll still walk away. So, Lily, I'm done trying to stop you."

He turned and gave Mark's chair a hard, final shove, sending it sliding into a patch of shadow. Then he walked away, his figure getting smaller, swallowed by the dark at the other end of the warehouse.

"You and him," his voice floated back, already fading. "Have a nice life. Don't forget to go to the hospital. I won't be taking you anymore."

And he was gone.

The silence he left behind was huge. It was filled only with Mark's frantic, muffled grunts. I stood there, the truth of his words seeping into me like poison. He's letting me go. The one thing I'd fought for last time was now the one thing that felt like a death sentence. Leo didn't want me anymore. He had finally, really, given up.