The silence after that is brutal.
Raw.
Traz drags his hands down his face, like he’s trying to peel himself out of his own damn skin.
"I was scared," he mutters.
The words are so soft I almost miss them.
I blink.
"You?" I sneer, bitterness coating every syllable. "The big bad mercenary? Scared?"
He lifts his head, meeting my stare without flinching.
"Yeah," he says. "Scared I'd ruin you. Scared Petru would use you against me. Scared you'd die because of me."
Tears blur my vision.
I swipe them away with the back of my hand, furious at myself.
"Newsflash, Traz," I hiss. "You ruined me anyway."
His shoulders sag, like the fight’s bleeding out of him.
Like he knows he deserves every damn word.
The kids watch us, silent and scared, their little bodies pressed together for protection.
I see it—see the fear we’re feeding them—and it twists the knife deeper.
I turn away, wrapping my arms around myself, holding in the sob clawing up my throat.
"You think fear makes you a man?" I whisper, voice shaking. "It makes you a coward."
The word hangs there.
Heavy.
Final.
Traz doesn’t defend himself.
Doesn’t argue.
Just sits there, bleeding and broken, watching me like he’s drowning.
The kids don’t move.
Neither do I.
The room feels like it’s caving in.
Crushing us all under the weight of everything we never said.
Everything we can’t take back.
Everything we still don’t know how to fix.
