Plaything in one's palm
A final verdict?
Caius took a step into the room. The faint light from the window caught his features. Lynn’s breath hitched. Caius looked… ravaged. His face was pale, etched with deep lines of exhaustion. Dark circles bruised the skin under his eyes, which held a hollow, haunted look. His usually impeccable hair was disheveled, as if he’d been running his hands through it repeatedly. And Lynn caught it then—the faint, sharp scent of expensive whiskey clinging to him, not the smell of celebration, but of solitary, desperate consumption.