María José flinched when I said her name.
"María José," I repeated, gently, the way a parent might call a startled animal. "You're safe. It's just me."
Just me. As if that should mean something. As if I hadn't spent the last five months building a throne out of lies and compulsion just to sit at her side.
She was still frozen. She had one hand pressed to the underside of her belly, and the other caught between clutching her towel and reaching for something that could ground her. Her eyes were wide, darting from the locked door to my face and back again.
I stepped forward, slowly, like she was a deer in the woods. I hated that she looked at me with fear. Not because I didn't deserve it—no, I did, but because I wanted more than fear. I wanted ownership. I wanted her under me, not beneath me.
"Don't look at me like that," I said softly, brushing a hand through my hair. "I didn't mean to scare you. I just… I lost myself for a second."
