Suddenly the little fortune she’d prided herself on seemed pathetic. No amount of money would erase the addictions, the crimes, the murders, and the fact that Kohl now considered her worth less than dirt. But what more was there to yearn for? Her throat closed up when she realized she didn’t have an answer. Teo’s words, telling her to decide what was important to her and put her mind to it entirely, rang through her mind again. She’d always thought she had a clear answer to that, but with Teo gone, and Ryuu telling her to do something else with her life, her future took on a blurry, confusing quality.

“I don’t imagine your life was easy growing up,” Ryuu said, ignoring the calls on his own character. “But you’re smart. I’m sure you could do anything you put your mind to. Now that you’re older, why can’t you find something else? Why can’t you reach higher?”

“Because it would mean I’m not a failure. If I can open my own tradehouse, it means I did the best work with the little that I was given. Don’t take that away from me by telling me that I can reach higher, that the sky is the limit. My sky and yours are not the same. Let me touch my own sky.”

After a pause, he said, “You’re right. You do that a lot, you know? You always make me see your side of things. I hope you can see mine too. To you, my brother is the reason you lost your job and the reason your life is threatened by the people you used to work for. So, I guess I’m trying to say that I’m grateful you chose to work for me instead. I’m sorry the sketch I gave to the Sentinel helped make it easier for people to find you. I’m sorry you have to be afraid.”

Her stomach squirmed uneasily as his words faded away. Kouta was a good person who had continued his parents’ tradition of helping Inosen, and his only crime was trying to find the truth behind their murder. But Kohl had ordered her to kill him. If she succeeded, she would get everything she’d ever wanted. If she failed, she’d die at Kohl’s hand. She would accomplish this job no matter what.

But she could no longer kill Ryuu simply because it was what Kohl would do. After all the help he’d been in rescuing Teo, she just couldn’t. Maybe he was rubbing off on her.

She didn’t belong in Ryuu’s world. She belonged in her own, where there was no strife with Kohl and where she could walk freely through the city and know she was safe. Only killing Kouta would fix it all and return her to where she was supposed to be. And it would return Ryuu to living far above—and indifferent to—her. Nothing Ryuu said would change her mind on that. Not even the warmth of his eyes or the way he smiled in her direction would sway her. Those were the things she wanted Kohl to give her once she fixed this.