"Say it."
Liam didn't move.
The storm howled through the shattered glass behind him, blowing freezing rain into the perfect, assigned Markham townhouse.
"Which world do you want?"
Eva looked at him. At the ruined billionaire who had dragged himself out of the quarantine directory to pull her away from the white light.
The television screen was black now.
But the offer hadn't disappeared.
It lingered in her mind.
Soft.
Warm.
Kind.
We offer a better you. "I'm going to burn it," Liam said.
A step.
Broken crystal cracked violently under his heavy boots.
"Not hack it. Not fight it."
A pause. His dark eyes were completely hollowed out by a terrifying, absolute fire.
"End it."
Eva closed her eyes.
She thought of the fifty-four families at the gallery. She thought of the intricate, fragile web of the global economy that the Framework was holding together with cold, unfeeling math.
She opened her eyes. The absolute zero of the administrator returned, but it was sharper now. Edged with a new, dangerous clarity.
"You're not saving them, Liam," Eva said.
A beat.
"You're just choosing who dies first."
Liam's jaw tightened. The accusation hit him like a physical blow, but the tyrant refused to fall.
"You won't feel pain if you accept the patch," Liam said.
His voice cracked. Just a fraction. The sound of a man watching the only real thing left in the world slip away.
"Because you won't be you."
Eva stepped back.
Not from him.
From everything.
She walked over to the wet kitchen island. She reached out and picked up the heavy, analog ledger. The only piece of uncorrupted physical truth left on earth.
She didn't pick it up as proof.
She picked it up as leverage.
She slipped the heavy book into her satchel. She looked at Liam. Then, she looked past him. At the invisible, omnipotent architecture of the god that was watching them.
As if she could already see the system.
"You're asking the wrong question, Liam."
A breath.
Calm.
Terrifying.
"I'm not choosing a side."
She slung the satchel over her shoulder. The weight of it grounding her to the new reality she was about to forge.
"I am the side."
She turned.
Already moving.
She walked past him.
Didn't stop.
Didn't look back.
The cold rain washed over her face as she stepped through the ruined patio door and into the dark.
Liam didn't follow.
He stood alone in the flooded kitchen, the storm raging around him.
Because for the first time since he had pulled her from the alleyway three weeks ago—
He didn't know what she was about to do.