Johnny Gonzales let her walk. Watched the woman he built a life with disappear, bags packed with everything but the truth.

Winnie left to fix a wreck that wasn't hers to begin with. A broken person chasing another broken person, and I?coward that I am?let her. I didn't beg. Didn't stop her. I sat in the silence she left behind and convinced myself it was better this way.

Now she's back.

And it's like seeing a ghost. A beautiful, devastating ghost who doesn't belong in the daylight anymore. She's older. Sharper. But the storm in her eyes is the same.

I freeze. Rage coils in my chest, not at her?but at myself. For letting her go. For pretending it didn't ruin me.

She's in Whispering Oaks, throwing down papers with that flat voice I remember too well. "Sign these. Then you'll never see me again."

Like hell.

Because this version of her? The one who says she's done? I want her more than I ever wanted the girl who left.

I won't let her go again. Not without a war. Not without reminding her who she is.

Mine. Always f***ing mine.

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