Author's Preface
[Annie]
Rain taps against the car window, turning the streetlights outside into blurred streaks of amber and white.
Inside the back seat of the car, the silence is heavy, but it lacks the razor-sharp tension of the courtroom corridor.
Kai leans his head back against the headrest, his eyes half-closed.
The sharp, decisive stance he held during the hearing is gone.
His face is flushed, and even through his suit jacket, I can feel the heat coming off him.
I sit next to him, my fingers gripping the edge of the leather folder in my lap until my knuckles turn pale.
My shoulders tense as I wait for it.
I know how Kai is—he notices everything, and he rarely lets anything go.
Any second now, he's going to bring up James.
Kai doesn't open his eyes, but his voice cuts through the quiet hum of the tires.
"You knew him, didn't you?"
Here it comes , I think, my chest tightening.
I brace myself for the interrogation—the probing questions, the demand to know who James is to me.
"School," I say, keeping my voice flat and unreadable.
A beat passes.
The windshield wipers sweep across the glass with a wet scrape.
I stay completely still, waiting for the follow-up: How long? What happened? Why did you look at him like that?
Kai turns toward me, his eyes taking in my stiff posture, but he doesn't press any further.
"I see," he says softly.
He leans his head back against the rest and closes his eyes again.
The car settles back into silence.
I blink, staring at the side of his face.
Nothing else comes—no prodding or subtle tests.
He accepts my answer without pushing for more, and I feel my grip on the folder slowly loosen.
Twenty minutes into the drive, Kai reaches for his phone.
His thumb hovers over the screen, but his fingers shake, missing the icon twice as he tries to open his messages.
He lets out a soft, frustrated breath and tries again.
I reach over and firmly take the phone out of his hand.
His skin burns hot against my palm.
"John, please pull over at the next stop," I call out toward the front seat. "We're stopping."
John glances back through the rearview mirror, his brow furrowing as he looks from Kai to me. "Ms. Annie, we still need to review the injunction notes before tomorrow morning—"
"Pull over, John," I say, cutting him off before he can get into work mode. "Your boss is currently trying to text with his eyes shut."
"I am perfectly functional," Kai mutters, though he doesn't actually reach to take the phone back.
He just leans his shoulder against mine, his weight heavy against me. "It was a very important email."
"It was probably a draft you already sent twice," I say, setting his phone in my bag. "We're eating."
Kai lets out a long sigh that turns into a faint, exhausted laugh against my shoulder. "You're very bossy. Did you know this?"
"Someone has to manage you," I say. "John is too polite to do it."
A little later, John pulls the car into the parking lot of a quiet roadside diner, shaking his head with a faint smile in the mirror.
The diner smells of fried batter and stale coffee.
We sit in a red vinyl booth near the back, tucked away from the rain outside.
We place our orders while John heads to the smoking room, saying he'd already eaten at the court canteen.
When the waiter sets down a steaming bowl of vegetable soup in front of Kai, he picks up his spoon, but he doesn't eat.
Instead, he starts pushing a slice of mushroom to the outer rim of the bowl.
Then another.
I lean back, watching him push the mushrooms around with quiet precision.
"Do you still not like mushrooms?" I ask.
Kai's spoon freezes mid-air.
He looks up, a flicker of genuine surprise crossing his tired face.
"How did you know I don't like mushrooms?"
"In university," I say casually, reaching across the small table and sliding his bowl toward my side. "Whenever we ate together in the cafeterias or during late-night study sessions, you'd spend ten minutes building a little barrier of them on the edge of your plate."
Without waiting for his answer, I grab a fork and start picking out the rest, dropping them onto my napkin.
I don't think twice about it—I just remember.
Across the table, Kai goes completely still.
The tired smirk fades from his face as he watches me pick the mushrooms out of his soup.
When I finally look up, his eyes are still on me.
I slide the clean bowl back to him, along with a glass of water and two fever pills I bought at the register counter.
"There," I say, tapping the edge of the table. "Saved you ten minutes. Eat."
Kai doesn't touch the spoon immediately.
His hand rests on the table, his fingers lightly curling into the paper placemat.
"You remembered," he murmurs, his voice low, almost to himself.
"Of course I noticed," I say, taking a sip of my tea and looking past him at the flickering neon sign outside. "You were literally right next to me most of the time."
For a moment, Kai just looks at me.
Then he lets out a quiet, exhausted chuckle and picks up his pills. "Fair enough."
Before he eats, he reaches across the narrow table, grabs the little stainless-steel creamer pitcher, and pours a deliberate, exact splash into my tea—just enough to turn it light amber, precisely how I drink it.
I freeze for a second, watching the milk swirl into the tea.
"See?" Kai says, leaning back with a quiet, triumphant look. "I pay attention too."
"You just want credit for doing the bare minimum."
"I am a sick man, Annie. A splash of milk takes heroic effort," he says, faking a cough and lightly furrowing his brows.
I end up laughing—a real, light sound that breaks whatever lingering tension was left from the courtroom.
Kai smiles at me, and for a moment, he looks less exhausted.
For the next half hour, we trade quiet jokes, complain about John's overly strict scheduling, and share a plate of fries that Kai claims he's too refined to eat—until I catch him sneaking three when he thinks I'm not looking.
[ *** ]
The rain has turned into a thin drizzle by the time we walk back out to the car.
John opens the doors for us and climbs into the front.
Kai stands by the open rear door, holding it open.
I stop at the frame, turning to face him directly.
The dim orange light of the diner sign catches the dampness on his coat shoulders.
"You're really not going to ask?" I ask softly. "About James?"
Kai looks down at me with an open expression.
"You told me to keep things professional," Kai says softly, his voice grounded and steady. "Who he was to you isn't my business. If you want to tell me, you will."
I stare up at him, my throat tightening.
I realize he's not waiting for an explanation.
He's choosing to leave it alone.
Kai catches the slight shiver in my posture and leans down just enough so his head is level with mine.
"Besides," he whispers, a flash of his usual dry humor returning to his eyes, "you just stole all the mushrooms out of my soup. I'd be an idiot to ruin a night where you're actually being nice to me."
A small, involuntary smile tugs at my lips. "I can always put them back."
"Don't you dare," he says, stepping back with a quiet laugh and gesturing toward the dry interior of the car. "Get in before your tea wears off."
I step into the back seat and slide across the cool leather.
Kai climbs in after me, closing the door, and the car pulls back out onto the dark highway.
I lean my head back against the headrest, looking out the window as the rain glides across the glass.
And it's only as the diner lights fade in the distance that it hits me:
Somewhere along the way, I'd stopped thinking about James.