Alina's pov They told me about my mother's execution that evening, Austin delivering the news with careful, clinical detachment, as though he expected me to shatter completely the moment the words left his mouth. The ankle monitor felt heavier than usual against my skin as I sat there, waiting for some feeling, any feeling, to finally arrive. I didn't shatter. I simply sat there, absorbing the finality of it, waiting for grief to arrive the way I assumed it should. It never fully came. Just a strange, hollow emptiness where grief was supposed to live. "Are you alright?" Austin asked carefully, clearly unprepared for my lack of visible reaction. "I don't know," I admitted honestly. "I spent my entire life terrified of disappointing her. Now she's gone, and I don't know what to do with everything I used to organize my life around." He said nothing further, simply leaving me alone with the strange, unfamiliar quiet settling over the room. Later that night, unable to sleep, I found
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