Ayla's POV
I rested my hands against the railing, breathing in the open air, grounding myself. My heart was still racing, but beneath it was something softer. Something steady. A sense of being seen in a way I hadn't expected and hadn't known I needed.
"Thank you," I said finally, my voice low but sincere. It felt like too small a phrase for something this carefully given, but it was all I had.
She inclined her head slightly, accepting it without ceremony.
We stood there in companionable silence, the city humming faintly below us, its noise softened by distance until it felt unreal. The terrace seemed suspended outside of time, as though the world had paused without explanation, just for us.
I found myself wondering when work had stopped feeling like work. When a simple debrief had shifted into something this quiet, this deliberate. I couldn't tell whether I was reading too much into it or not nearly enough.
For now, I didn't question it.
