Page 62 of The Mercenary's Hidden Heir
Waiting.
She tosses the last scrap into the trash heap and leans against the opposite wall, arms folded, staring at the ground like it’s got all the answers she’s never gotten.
"You gonna keep runnin'?" she says, voice low but not sharp.
Not angry.
Just tired.
I shake my head.
Slow.
"I’m here."
She laughs, soft and brittle.
"Yeah," she says. "You’re here now."
The way she says it—like it’s almost too late—cuts deeper than any knife.
I don’t say anything.
I just sit there.
Let her have the floor.
She deserves it.
She crosses her arms tighter, biting at her bottom lip, like she’s wrestling herself.
Then she lets out a breath so shaky it hurts to hear.
"You wanna know what it was like after you left?" she asks.
I nod once.
Hard.
She lifts her chin, eyes glittering like broken glass.
"First week, I thought you were dead," she says, voice calm in that terrifying way people sound when they’re too numb to feel. "Or maybe locked up. Tortured. Something."
I grind my molars together, fists curling on my thighs.
"But you weren’t," she says, staring straight through me. "You just left."
I swallow the thousand apologies clawing up my throat.
Because words are cheap.
She keeps going, steady as a blade.
"Petru paraded me around like a trophy after that," she says. "Dressed me up. Showed me off. Whispered to his men about how I was the last gift the great mercenary Traz rejected."
My stomach knots.
She smiles, bitter and hollow.
