Zariah didn't show up at the gallery that day.
Her phone buzzed every hour. Missed calls, texts, even one from a number she didn't save but somehow know belonged to Dorian.
Are you okay?
She didn't answer.
She sat crossed legged on the floor of her bedroom, the flash drive from Nova in her hand, weighing nothing but feeling like it carried a hundred ghosts. Her mother's journal sat open beside her . The Photograph facedown. The message, you're not supposed to be looking there, still pulsed in her mind like a fever she couldn't sweat out. Her heart was racing again but not from fear this time.
From fury.
Dorian Voss has been there, in her childhood, on the edge of her mother's life. Who the hell was he really? Why he said nothing?
And yet...
Some part of her didn't believe he wanted to hurt her. Not entirely.
She picked up her phone and hovered over his contact. She didn't want to text. She wanted answers. Answers wrapped in warmth and truth, not the polished, icy mask he wore at work. She wanted to see his eyes and when she asked him: Why were you in the Photograph?
A knock startled her. Sharp but three beats.
Zariah froze. Another knock. Then. "It's me."
His voice.
Dorian.
She opened the door slowly. He didn't look dangerous. He looked... tired, tense and rain clung to the collar of his black coat and his dark eyes softened the moment he saw her face.
"I was worried," he said. "You disappeared."
Zariah crossed her arms. "You should be good at disappearing. Seems like something you've done before."
His jaw flexed. "You saw the picture."
"I saw more than that," she said. "You were there. You knew my mother."
He stepped past her, into the apartment without waiting for permission. She allowed him, maybe because she wanted to see if he'd lie to her face. Maybe because she hoped he wouldn't.
"I knew her," Dorian said. "But not the way you think.?
Zariah stayed silent.
He continued. "I was tasked with protecting her, watching her. She had access to files she wasn't supposed to. She got too close to something powerful and when she refused to back down... They sent people to keep tabs. I was one of them but I didn't expect you."
"You knew me?" Her voice cracked "even back then?"
He looked at her, something dangerous and tender in his gaze.
"You were just a kid, your mom asked me to stay away from you. She didn't want you growing up with shadows."
Zariah's breath caught "But you showed up again. Years later at the gallery."
"I didn't plan that." He ran a hand through his wet hair. "But when I saw you Zariah, I didn't know it was you until that night. At the opening."
Silence stretched between them like a blade. She wanted to believe him but she'd learned that believe was the first step toward betrayal.
"I don't know what you want from me," she whispered.
He stepped closer. " I want to protect you. I know you don't trust me but I swear to you, I didn't hurt your mother. I tried to help her but I failed."
She hated how much she wanted to believe him. Her body ached from exhaustion, from grief, from the weight of memory she didn't know she had until now. And still there he was.
Dorian reached for her hand. Slowly. Like a man who knew he'd lost the right but still hoped.
She didn't pull away.
"I'm tired of feeling like I'm standing on a ledge," she said.
"Then don't stand alone," he murmured.
Zariah's throat tightened. He pulled her into a hug, gentle, warm, steady. She didn't want it but she needed it, not because it fixed anything but because it reminded her she was still real.
That someone, even someone with secrets, still wanted her safe.and in the moment, his arms didn't feel like a lie.
They felt like a soft place to land.