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“Where did we go wrong?” he asks.

The question is so quiet I almost do not hear it.

“We loved each other,” he says. “Once. We really loved each other.”

“Yes,” I say.

Maksim does not move behind me, but I know he’s watching us.

“I loved you once,” I continue. My voice remains even—not cold, not cruel, simply honest. “I will not deny that. You were important to me. You were my husband. You were part of my life for a long time.”

“Then why are you so cold to me?” he whispers. “And why am I still here?”

I look at him.

Really look at him.

Then I glance over my shoulder at Maksim.

His expression is unreadable, but I know him well enough to see the tension beneath it. The stillness in his shoulders. The way his eyes stay fixed on me, as if he is waiting to learn whether I came here for him or against him.

He is waiting for an answer too.

I turn back to Jake.

“You are here,” I say, my voice chillingly level, “because you made choices you believed had no consequences.”

Jake flinches, shaking his head frantically. “Tristan, please—”

“I spent years trying to protect you, Jake,” I continue, my tone measured and merciless. “Even after our divorce was finalized, even after I realized our marriage was a hollow mistake, I kept stepping in front of you. I kept shielding your name, covering your tracks, and keeping you away from people who would have buried you alive. But you couldn’t just take your settlement and live your life, could you? You kept poking your fingers into things you can’t fight, picking battles with a family you could never hope to survive.”

“Tristan, don’t do this,” Jake pleads, violently thrashing against the chair, terror turning his eyes wide and bloodshot. “Don’t take his side. Look at where we are. Look at what he’s doing to me. He is a psychopath. A dangerous, violent monster, Tristan! You can’t build a normal life with someone like him. You will never have peace or stability. Someone like him will drag you into hell and ruin you!”

I take one step back, giving myself room to look at both of them.

“Yes,” I say. “Maksim is a handful.”

Maksim’s eyes narrow slightly.

Jake stops talking.

“He is stubborn to a fault, reckless, completely unhinged, and he gets on my fucking nerves ninety percent of the time.” I continue, my voice softening as the truth carves its way out of my chest. “He picks fights, he’s always infuriating sarcastic, and he refuses to listen to reason.”

I take a deep breath.

“He drives me insane,” I go on, and my gaze shifts to Maksim’s. “Most days, I am one argument away from locking him in a room until he learns to say what he feels without threatening anyone.”

His brows rise.

Then I look back at Jake.

“But I would not know how to live without him.”

The room falls quiet.

My heart squeezes around the truth, but I don’t take it back.

“Three months without him in an empty bed, without his chaotic energy and his troubles, felt like drowning every day. It felt like living in a torture chamber of my own making,” I say, my voice steady and true. “Every day without him felt like punishment. Not because he is easy. He is not. Not because he makes my life quiet. He definitely does not. But because he is the only person who has ever made me feel genuine happiness after years of drowning in self-hate and thinking I don’t deserve it.”