AIDEN – POV
I couldn't breathe.
Not from the cold air or the weight in my chest—but from the way she looked on the ground, arms wrapped around her shaking frame like a child trying to hold in the pieces of herself that were still left.
Her belongings scattered beside her. A crumpled t-shirt. A journal. One of my shirts, too—stuffed in the corner of her bag like she was torn between leaving and remembering.
And her.
Curled in on herself. Eyes red. Shoulders trembling. Lips cracked from biting back every scream she'd never dared to voice until now.
"I'm sorry…" she kept whispering. "I'm sorry… I'm sorry…"
God.
No.
Not like this.
This wasn't the girl who used to throw venom-laced words like daggers. This wasn't the woman who mocked my pain with a smile, who wielded her beauty and cruelty like twin blades. This was someone else. Someone smaller. Someone I'd never really looked at—really looked at—because I was too obsessed with destroying the monster I believed she was.
