Page 65 of Oliver
The silence stretched, thick with unspoken words, and then he broke it. "You kept it?"
I hesitated. "I found it in the hallway. I figured you might need it."
He looked up at me, something dark flickering behind his gaze. "You should have thrown it away."
I swallowed. I should have. But I didn't. And we both knew why.
"Zahra!" My aunt called again, impatience sharpening her tone.
"Coming!" I called back, then turned to Oliver. "I'll see you back at the hotel."
He nodded, still rolling the button between his fingers, looking thoughtful and distant.
I walked away, following my aunt back to the main garden. Then I made the mistake of glancing over my shoulder. Oliver was still rooted to his spot, eyes still intent on the memento I’d kept tucked away all day, face still blank.
We'd addressed what happened between us. We'd acknowledged it, set new boundaries, and decided to move forward as adults, but was it enough?
I snapped my head forward, looking away.It had to be enough.
The contract was still in place. Our arrangement still intact. We could maintain the professional relationship we both needed while preserving the fragile trust that had begun to grow between us.
And if my skin still hummed with awareness when he was near, if my thoughts still drifted to the feel of his hands on my body, well—that was my problem to manage. Not his.
What happened in Norman stayed in Norman.
I just had to keep repeating it until I believed it. Until it stopped feeling like a lie.
Twenty
OLIVER
The GPS toldme to turn right in three hundred feet, but I didn’t need it. I knew these streets by heart. Didn’t matter how many years passed, some places get burned into you, down to the marrow.
I slowed the rental car as I approached the familiar street. I hadn't planned to drive past my grandparents' house. It wasn't part of my carefully planned schedule for the day. But now that I was here, I couldn't resist the gravitational pull of the place that had once been my safe haven.
I expected changes. A new paint job, different landscaping, something. Anything.
What I saw instead stopped my breath.
The white Colonial wasn’t white anymore. The siding was gray with grime, the gutters sagged under the weight of rotting leaves, and the windows were boarded up like someone had given up even pretending to fix the broken glass.
And the porch, the one where my grandmother taught me to find constellations, was rotting under the weight of neglect.
I pulled over, unable to tear my eyes away from the wreckage.
This place had been my sanctuary. The only steady thing in a childhood full of expectations I could never meet. The one place I thought was mine.
And they’d let it rot.
Like they did to everything else that didn’t fit into their narrow worldview.
My fingers tightened around the steering wheel until my knuckles turned white. The physical discomfort offered a welcome distraction from the hollow ache spreading through my chest.
I'd told myself this trip was about justice. About retrieving what rightfully belonged to us. About securing Emmet’s future.
But sitting here, staring at the abandoned shell of my past, I could no longer pretend this wasn't personal.
The timing felt cruelly appropriate. Facing one betrayal while investigating another.
