Briggs’ POV
I should leave.
The thought settles in the moment the door slides shut behind me, quiet and firm, like an instinct. It’s the same instinct that has kept things simple for years: step away before something becomes complicated, before attention turns into expectation, before control slips into something else. It has always worked, until now. Because I’m still here.
Standing in my own space, glass in hand, the city stretching endlessly beyond the windows, and none of it holds my attention. She does, out there on the balcony.
I take a sip of water, letting the cold settle on my tongue, hoping it does something for the heat sitting under my skin, It doesn’t.
She doesn’t perform, that’s the first thing that stays with me. No calculated movements, no attempt to soften herself, no
