Mary Ann’s POV
I had not meant to follow him.
After leaving the command center, I returned to the room long enough to collect the healing records my mother wanted me to review. Modric had disappeared before I came back downstairs, and one of the guards mentioned that he had walked toward the southern gardens.
I told myself I needed air.
That was all.
The command room had felt too warm after hours of reports, coded symbols, and questions without answers. The initials V.R. remained in my mind, along with the strange hesitation in Modric’s face when he saw them.
I followed the garden path without thinking about where it led.
Then I heard his voice.
Low.
Controlled.
Private.
I stopped before the stone bridge, hidden partly by flowering bushes and the shadow of a tall tree. Modric st
