CASSIAN
I stood there on the cold stone of the driveway long after the sound of Noah's footsteps had completely vanished.
The silence that followed was heavy, broken only by the distant, lazy hum of morning traffic somewhere across the city.
My chest felt hollow, like someone had carved out my ribs and left behind an open, bleeding void.
Every instinct in my body screamed at me to run after him.
I wanted to catch up to him, grab his hand, drag him back inside, and strip away every single lie we had both spent months building.
I wanted to tell him the truth... that I loved him so fiercely it terrified me, that seeing him with Leo had broken something inside my head, and that the only reason I had reached for Cyan in the dark was because I was drowning and didn't know how to stay afloat without someone pulling me back to the surface.
I wanted to say all of that.
Instead, I stayed rooted to the pavement, watching the empty space where he had just been standing.
