Distance was best.

CHRISTIEN’S POV;

The door slammed hard enough to shake the walls of the room.

I stayed still long after she left.

My jaw tightened slowly as silence settled around me again.

She was angry.

Good.

Maybe anger would finally make her stay away from me.

I looked down at my shoulder. The bandage wrapped across my back and arm was pink.

Of course it was pink.

I should have taken it off immediately. Instead, I kept staring at it like an idiot.

The room suddenly felt too warm.

Too quiet.

Too full of her.

Her scent still lingered faintly in the air, mixed with antiseptic and the metallic smell of blood.

Annoying.

I bent down, picked up my shirt from the floor, and pulled it on carefully despite the sharp pain that spread through my shoulder.

Pain didn’t matter.

It never really had.

I was used to it.

What I wasn’t used to… was her.

The way she looked at me.

The way she spoke to me.

The way she kept pushing past walls people usually avoided.

I grabbed my phone and texted Sophie.

Book me a suite at the Imperial Hotel tonight.

The reply came almost immediately.

Are you okay? Did you get treated?

I ignored the question.

Sophie already knew what happened whenever my father’s temper got bad enough. She knew better than to ask for details.

Another message appeared seconds later.

Is this because of work… or the girl?

My expression darkened instantly.

So she noticed too.

Dangerous.

I locked the phone without replying and shoved it into my pocket.

Then I left the room.

As I walked downstairs, another memory surfaced without permission.

Davis’ voice.

“Ava grew up without a mother, so my father and I spoiled her too much.”

“But now she’s grown,” I had replied.

“I’m saying this because I want you to stop looking at her like that,” he said carefully. “You’re my best friend, Christien. Just treat her like a younger sister.”

My chest tightened painfully.

The problem was…

I never looked at her the way he thought I did.

And that made everything worse.

Davis trusted me.

Out of everyone around him, he trusted me the most.

Meanwhile, I was starting to become the exact person he would want far away from her.

I grabbed my keys from the sitting room table and headed for the door.

Before leaving, my eyes lifted upstairs automatically.

The light in Ava’s room was still on.

She was probably awake.

Still angry.

Still thinking about what happened earlier.

Good.

That was safer.

Distance had always worked for me before.

Work.

Hotels.

Business trips.

Silence.

That was how I survived.

Not soft girls with emotional eyes and pink bandages wrapped around my skin.

My phone buzzed again as I stepped outside.

Your suite is ready.

I unlocked the car and got in.

The engine started smoothly, but my grip stayed tight around the steering wheel for several seconds before I finally drove off.

The city lights blurred past the windows as I headed toward the hotel.

But no matter how far I drove, my thoughts stayed in that house.

In that room.

With her.

And somehow that irritated me more than the pain burning through my shoulder.

Because Ava was becoming dangerous in the worst possible way.

Not loud.

Not obvious.

Just quiet enough to slip past my control before I noticed it happening.