The truth.
The test in the drawer.
The way my body had already decided something I hadn’t.
He nodded once. “Good.”
CHAPTER 24
ALOIS
“Good.”
The word settled between us and didn’t move.
Her eyes held—just long enough to confirm she’d heard what I meant and not what I said—before she broke it cleanly, turning back to the counter. Her fingers flattened briefly against the edge of the surface, the pads pressing into the wood just enough to leave a faint shift in color before she released it.
Something was wrong.
Rafael moved first, like the silence had run its course without his permission. “You’re stayingherefull-time?” he asked.
I didn’t look at him immediately. My focus stayed where it had been—on Bea—tracking the way she reached for the coffee pot again even though both mugs were already full, the way she adjusted it half an inch to the left like alignment mattered.
“Yes.” She answered for me.
Her father’s gaze shifted to her without turning his head. “I asked him.”
“I know,” she said, already smoothing it, already redirecting. “I just—he’s been here. It’s not new. It’s the job”
“Full-time,” I confirmed.
He nodded once. “And the season?” he continued. “Demanding schedule.”
“It’s what it is.”
“Is it ever,” he snickered lightly.
Bea stepped in. “We should grab some lunch,” she huffed, setting the coffee pot down.
Her eyes flicked to mine again, sharper this time. I held her there for a second, long enough to feel the edge of that request before I let it go.
“Give me a minute,” I relented, already turning.
The bedroom door closed behind me, muting the apartment down to low, indistinct sound—the cadence of voices carrying through the wall without shape, the hum of heat pushing against the winter pressed up outside.
I crossed to the dresser, pulling the top drawer open, the motion automatic—muscle memory layered over routine, something simple while everything else sat just slightly off.
Fabric. Clean.
My hand moved through it, pushing aside a sweater, reaching for a shirt—something slipped. Light. Quick. Out of place. It hit the floor with a hollow plastic sound that didn’t belong in the room.
For a second, nothing moved. Not my hands. Not my breath. Not the rest of the room around me. The world narrowed to the object at my feet and the space it occupied.
I bent slowly, picking it up between my fingers, the plastic cool and weightless in a way that didn’t match what it held.
Two lines.
Clear.