The city looked different from the window of a moving cab. Colder. More distant. Buildings blurring like truths that slipped out of reach the moment she thought she had them. Ava leaned against the cool glass, her fingers wrapped tightly around the business card Amira Maddox had handed her days ago.
"If you ever stop guessing and want the truth—come find me."
She hadn't been ready then.
But now, after what Damien had said at the old Sinclair studio, after the way he'd looked at her—not with superiority, but with something like regret—she couldn't stay in the dark anymore. She wouldn't.
Amira's building stood on a quiet East Side street, ivy crawling up the bricks like old secrets. The loft was airy and lived-in, filled with the scent of fresh coffee and the hum of jazz playing low from somewhere deep inside.
When Amira opened the door, she looked unsurprised.
"I wondered how long it would take."
Ava stepped inside without speaking. She didn't need pleasantries. She needed truth.
"Still no cameras?" Amira asked.
Ava gave a small nod. "Just answers."
Amira led her through the open-concept space to a long table covered in folders, scribbled notes, and a MacBook already open. She clicked the trackpad once and brought up a single file: JS_FINAL_DISCUSSION_10_27.
She didn't ask if Ava was ready.
She just pressed play.
Jonathan Sinclair's voice filled the room. Calm. Controlled. It hit Ava harder than expected—like hearing a ghost who wasn't quite ready to leave.
Then came Damien's voice. Younger. Unpolished, but still sharp. His tone was respectful, almost cautious.
They weren't fighting. They weren't plotting. They were... negotiating.
Ava stood frozen as the conversation unfolded.
Her father: "I built this with people I trusted. But they're not here anymore. You are."
Damien: "I'm not trying to take it from you. I'm trying to stop others from doing worse."
Jonathan: "Then help me merge. Not sell."
Damien: "The board won't allow it. Not without blood."
Jonathan: "Then bleed with me."
Silence.
Damien's voice: "If this leaks, I won't be able to protect you."
Jonathan: "I'm already unprotected."
The audio stopped.
Ava hadn't realized she was shaking until her arm brushed against the table.
Amira's eyes stayed on her. Calm. Compassionate. Unflinching.
"That's what they didn't want anyone to hear," Amira said softly. "Your father wasn't destroyed by Damien. He was trying to preserve what little control he had left."
Ava swallowed the lump in her throat. "Why did Lucien keep this?"
"Because he thought one day, someone would need it more than the world needed a clean obituary."
"And Damien?" Ava asked, voice rough. "He never said anything."
"Because it wouldn't have mattered coming from him, would it?" Amira replied. "Not when you'd already chosen what version of the story you were willing to live with."
The words stung.
Because they were true.
Ava moved toward the window, needing air. The skyline stared back at her through thick glass, unchanged and indifferent. Her entire belief system—every ounce of fuel she'd used to climb—was cracking.
"I hated him," she said quietly.
"You needed to," Amira answered.
Ava turned around. "And now I don't know what to do."
"That's how truth works," Amira said. "It ruins you before it saves you."
Ava left the loft without speaking much more, the weight of the recording still coiled tight around her ribs. She didn't go home. She didn't go back to Easton.
Instead, she ended up walking.
It was nearly dark when she found herself standing in front of Blackwood Tower.
Again.
Like it was pulling her.
She stared up at the glowing floors until she couldn't talk herself out of it anymore. Then she stepped inside.
The receptionist looked startled when she asked for Damien.
"He's not expecting anyone."
Ava gave a faint smile. "Tell him it's Ava Sinclair. He'll want to be."
Ten minutes later, she was standing in Damien's private office, surrounded by floor-to-ceiling glass, the city stretching endlessly behind him.
He looked at her like he hadn't decided if this was a blessing or a trap.
She answered the question before he could ask.
"I heard the recording."
Something shifted in his expression—subtle, but there.
"And?"
"You lied."
"I didn't lie," he said quietly. "I left things out."
"Same thing."
Damien stood, moving around the desk. His jacket was off. Shirt sleeves rolled. He looked less like the man who built empires and more like the man who'd once tried to stop hers from falling apart.
"I couldn't save him," he said. "I tried."
"You could've saved me," she said, voice trembling.
His eyes darkened. "I didn't know you needed saving."
"You knew I hated you. You let me."
"I thought I deserved it."
They stared at each other, the silence between them thick with years.
Ava's breath caught in her chest, not because of rage this time—but because for the first time, she could see how deeply he carried it all. The guilt. The weight. The what-ifs.
"You didn't deserve the way I looked at you," she said.
Damien stepped closer, slowly, like she might shatter.
"And you didn't deserve the world I left you in."
The space between them shrank. One inch. Another.
He stopped, barely a breath away.
His voice dropped. "If I touch you now, you'll hate me for it tomorrow."
Ava looked up, lips parted. "Then don't stop."
He didn't.
His fingers brushed her jaw, reverent. His other hand slid gently to her hip, not demanding—just holding. His lips touched hers once, softly, like a question.
And when she didn't pull away, he answered it.
The kiss wasn't rough. It wasn't frantic. It was full of history and hesitations, of heartbreaks and buried things that could no longer stay buried.
When it broke, Ava rested her forehead against his.
She should've walked away.
She didn't.
Because something was changing now.
Not just between them.
Inside her.
And she was no longer afraid of what it meant to feel something that wasn't entirely safe.