JAKE

She turned around before I even said the words.

Her hands slid behind her back in a slow, deliberate motion—not the defiance of someone about to be arrested, but the quiet grace of someone surrendering something sacred.

She had accepted it already. I hadn't.

I had come here expecting—hell, hoping—to see nothing but the con. The manipulator. The woman still looking for the right string to pull, knowing a part of me might still care enough to let her.

But that wasn't what I got.

Instead, I was staring at the same woman I had fallen for—broken now, apologetic, hurting. And God help me, a desperate part of me wanted to believe that meant her feelings hadn't been a lie.

The problem was that it made what I had to do next feel like tearing my own heart out of my chest and slamming it against the wall just to hear it break.

And it hurt that she stood there with her shoulders squared and her head bowed slightly, waiting for me to finish the job. Like she knew I would. Like she believed she deserved it. Like she had already made her peace with losing everything.

For a moment, I couldn't breathe. I just kept looking at her.

Her hair was twisted loosely, a few strands slipping free to curl at the back of her neck—the same hair my fingers used to tangle in, the same neck I kissed on slow mornings before the world got loud.

The sweater hanging off her shoulders was too big, too soft. She looked small inside it. Fragile.

God, she looked fragile.

And I hated that—hated the part of me that wanted to step forward, to wrap her up and tell her it was going to be okay.

It wasn't. And it would never be again.

Yet, it still didn't erase the fact that this was Emma. My Emma.

The woman I had held in my arms. The woman I had memorized every inch of. The woman who had laughed into my neck in the dead of night, whispered things only meant for me to hear, made me believe—for the first time in my life—that love was something real, something you could hold in your hands.

And now, I was about to lock her in chains.

My hand moved to the inside of my coat. The cuffs were there, tucked into the inner pocket like they always were. I had carried them on every case. I had snapped them on murderers, traffickers, white-collar predators who left families broke and homeless.

Now they were for her.

The metal felt heavier than it ever had, as if it knew what I was about to do—and didn't want to do it either.

Something in me whispered, Don't do it... just don't. Take one step back. Say you can't. Say you'll let someone else do it. Say anything but what you're about to do.

But I didn't, because it was too late for that.

I stepped forward, slow as if each inch cost me something.

Her hands were still waiting behind her back. There was no flinch, no plea—just the stillness of someone who had already been crushed beneath the weight of it all.

I slid the first cuff around her wrist. The metal was cold against her skin, and she didn't so much as breathe. The click was soft, almost gentle, but in my ears it was a gunshot.

I paused on the second. My hand hovered over hers, fingers brushing warmth I shouldn't have noticed, shouldn't have wanted to.

Then the metal closed with another click, and something in my chest cracked open like a rib splitting clean down the middle.

It was done...

A job well executed.

A loose end tied.

A case... closed.

But it didn't feel like justice. It felt like grief—merciless, bone-deep grief that would cling to me and haunt every step I took after.

A moment of silence passed between us, heavy and suffocating.

I stared at her hands—bound now, helpless—and every part of me ached to undo what I had just done. To tear the whole damn world apart until none of this had to be real.

I opened my mouth—maybe to say something official, maybe to read her her rights—but the only thing that made it past my throat was, "Nothing matters now."

The instant the words left me, regret burned through my chest. Because I felt her flinch—small, but enough to reach me through the cuffs.

She didn't answer at first. She just stood there, her breath uneven, like she was trying to keep it from breaking. Then, barely above a whisper, she said, "It mattered. It mattered too much."

The words landed like a fist to the ribs.

My hand, still curled lightly around her wrist, tightened for a fraction of a second—just enough for her to feel it. Because she was right. It had mattered. More than anything I had ever let myself want.

And maybe—just for that one second—I wanted her to know that I knew it, too.

Then I let go. My hand dropped away from hers like it didn't belong there anymore. Because it didn't.

I stepped back.

She didn't turn to look at me. Didn't try to catch my eye. Maybe she couldn't. Maybe she knew that if she did, something in both of us would splinter, and we would never recover.

I glanced toward the window. The city beyond had vanished into white. The snow was still falling—fine, relentless flakes blurring the skyline, softening the edges of everything like it wanted to cover the world and start over.

I remembered, stupidly, that she once told me she loved snow.

"It makes everything feel... suspended," she had said. "Like maybe time can't reach you."

I should have known, even then, that she wasn't just wishing for beauty. She was wishing to pause the world because she knew how quickly it was going to burn.

I shook my head, forcing the memory out, and touched her elbow—light, impersonal, exactly the way protocol demanded.

"Let's go."

She nodded, not speaking. And we walked.

Out of the apartment.

Out of the dream.

Out of whatever life we had almost had.

I didn't look back.

And just like that, she was not my Emma anymore. Maybe she was never mine to begin with.