Page 119 of Silent Schemes

There's a bandage visible under his shirt, white against black, marking where my bullets entered.

The wounds I gave him, healing but not healed.

May never fully heal.

Some wounds don't. "Sentimental. It'll get you killed."

"You came to kill me?" I ask, not turning around.

If he's going to do it, I don't want to see it coming.

Don't want my last image to be of him pulling the trigger.

I'd rather remember him from before—gold in morning light, soft with sleep, the only time he ever looked peaceful.

"I came to say goodbye properly."

Now I turn, and the sight of him is a punch to the gut that makes my lungs forget how to work.

He looks older than three days should account for—new lines carved around his eyes like canyons, a hardness to his jaw that wasn't there before.

Gray threads through his dark hair that I swear are new.

I did that.

I carved those lines with betrayal, aged him with bullets that were supposed to save him, supposed to fool my father, supposed to buy us time.

He's still beautiful, but it's the beauty of broken glass—sharp, dangerous, reflective of everything around it, but transparent to nothing.

"Maya, stay in the car," I say without looking at her.

"Sienna—" Her voice holds a note of panic.

She knows who he is, what he represents, what he could do.

"Stay in the car. Lock the doors."

She obeys, the click of the locks loud.

As if those locks would stop him if he wanted to hurt her.

As if anything could stop Varrick Bane when he's decided to be violent.

But he doesn't even look at her, doesn't acknowledge her existence.

His eyes are fixed on me with an intensity that makes my skin burn and freeze simultaneously.

We circle each other in the empty parking lot, two predators recognizing their match.

The asphalt is wet with dew, slippery beneath our feet.

He moves first—not an attack, just a testing strike that I deflect easily.

Muscle memory from all those sessions in his gym, all those moments when violence turned to passion and back again.

I respond with a combination that he flows around like water, like we're dancing instead of fighting.

This isn't about hurting each other.