For a moment after the final crack, the world seemed to lose its sound.
Camille stood there with the broken drive in her hand, chest rising and falling, pulse hammering so hard it blurred everything else. The tiny fragments glittered faintly under the unstable lights useless now, powerless, dead.
And yet
The danger in the room didn't die with it.
It sharpened.
The man's expression changed completely. Whatever patience he had before whatever calculation was gone. What replaced it was colder. Direct. Violent in a quiet, controlled way that made Camille's stomach twist.
"You just destroyed leverage that could have bought you a future," he said slowly.
Camille swallowed, her fingers tightening around the broken remains. "If that was the only way to have a future, I didn't want it."
His gaze snapped to her. "That wasn't your decision to make."
"It was," she said, voice unsteady but holding. "Because it was my life you all kept gambling with."
Silence stretched.
