Lahat ng Kabanata ng You Left, I Could Have Fixed Us: Kabanata 61 - Kabanata 70

Chapter Sixty-OneMaya’s POVI didn’t move.Not at first.My fingers hovered over the door handle, the chill of the metal kissing the air between us but never meeting my skin. My pulse beat loud enough to drown out the silence, loud enough that I thought he must hear it, must feel it, the same way he always seemed to feel everything I tried to hide.Behind me, Ethan still hadn’t spoken again. But I could sense the weight of his stillness, the heat of his gaze. It pressed into my back like a touch he hadn’t yet allowed himself to give.The urge to flee and the need to stay tangled inside me, knotted so tightly they hurt.One more breath, I told myself. Just one.But the moment stretched, warped, and I realised there would never be just one. Every breath I took here bound me deeper to him to this impossible, unbearable gravity that pulled even when I resisted.“Say something,” I whispered.The words cracked the quiet like a fracture through glass.For a moment, there was nothing. Then,

Chapter Sixty-Three Maya’s POV Sleep never came. Not really. It hovered at the edge of my mind like a tide that wouldn’t break — rising, falling, never touching the shore. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw him standing there again, the shadow of his gaze holding me still, the echo of his voice burning through the quiet he’d left behind. Don’t ever hide from me again. The words looped in my head until I could barely breathe. The chamber felt too small. The walls seemed closer, the air heavier. I had stripped out of the gown I’d worn, the silk puddled at my feet like spilt wine, and pulled one of the linen sheets around myself to feel something clean, something untouched. But the air still smelled faintly of him — of heat and steel and something darker that clung to my skin. I sat there for a long time, knees drawn to my chest, the candlelight flickering across the curve of my arms. I could outrun shame by staying still. I thought silence could protect me. But silence was its ow

Chapter Sixty-FiveMaya’s POVThe door closed behind him with a sound too soft to match the storm he left in me.For a long time, I didn’t move.The silence felt different now — not the quiet of safety, but the echo of something unfinished, as if the air still carried the memory of his voice, his touch, the promise I couldn’t forget no matter how much I wanted to.Mine.The word still burned through me — a scar and a tether.I pulled the sheet tighter around my body and sat on the edge of the bed, my skin still tingling where his hand had lingered. It wasn’t from fear anymore. It was from something far worse — the memory of wanting him to stay.I pressed my palms to my face and breathed into them until the air grew warm and damp, until the shaking in my chest dulled into something I could almost control.The room was still faintly scented with him — leather, smoke, a trace of rain from his coat. It filled my lungs, clinging to me no matter how deeply I tried to exhale.I should have f

Chapter Sixty-Seven, Part IMaya’s POVThe morning light felt too fragile for the weight inside me.It slipped through the curtains in thin gold threads, catching on the dust that floated in the air — soft, harmless things that had no idea how heavy the world had become.I had not moved from the chair by the window since the sky began to pale. My nightgown was still clinging where the fabric had creased against my skin. The ink on the table had dried. The letter, still unfinished, lay in front of me like a wound I couldn’t close.I had written his name at the top.And then stopped.The quill rested against the page, its tip stained black, waiting for a truth I could not put into words. Everything I wanted to say sounded wrong when I tried to imagine how he would read it. No sentence didn’t tremble with guilt. No confession that didn’t sound like betrayal.The silence pressed around me.Somewhere outside, the castle stirred — a distant clang of metal, the echo of footsteps in the hall.

Chapter Sixty-EightMaya’s POVThe air outside was softer than I remembered.It brushed against my skin like a question cool, cautious, unsure if I still belonged here. The garden stretched before me in shades of silver and pale green, dew clinging to every blade, every petal, as though the world itself had been holding its breath with me.For a long while, I didn’t move. I simply let it surround me — the whisper of leaves, the faint hum of bees stirring somewhere deeper in the hedges, the quiet rhythm of water dripping from the stone fountain near the path.The noise inside me didn’t stop, but it quieted. It was strange how easily the world could feel sacred after breaking.I moved toward the fountain, the gravel crunching softly beneath my slippers. My hands brushed against the edge of the basin, cool and damp. I looked down into the water. My reflection wavered there, blurred by the ripples — a woman I almost didn’t know, her eyes darker, her mouth set in something that wasn’t quit