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The glow of the dying fire was the only light in the room, casting long shadows on the walls, a flickering reminder of all that had burned before. Ruth sat by the hearth, her knees drawn up to her chest, her gaze fixed on the dwindling embers. The room was eerily quiet, save for the occasional crackle of wood giving way to the flames. Her mind, however, was anything but still.

The weight of the night—of everything that had come crashing down—pressed heavily against her ribs. Her father's disappointment, Tommy's unspoken judgment, the broken pieces of her once steady, predictable life... she had made a choice, but at what cost? The realization was like a bruise in her chest, tender and raw, but there was no turning back. Not now.

She didn't hear the door open, nor the soft tread of footsteps that crossed the room until he was standing there, silhouetted by the dim light. Tommy.

He said nothing at first, simply watching her from the doorway, his figure a dark contrast to the firelight. His presence filled the room, a weight in the air she couldn't escape, and yet, Ruth didn't turn to face him. She didn't need to. She could feel him there, could feel the tension that radiated off him like heat from a furnace.

"You think I don't know what you're doing?" His voice was low, almost casual, but it wasn't the tone of someone who was uninterested. There was something dangerous in it. Something she couldn't quite place.

Ruth inhaled slowly, her chest tight. She didn't flinch at the sound of his voice; she had expected this. The confrontation. The reckoning. But it didn't stop the knot from forming in her throat. She exhaled, her breath steady despite the storm inside her.

"Then why haven't you stopped me?" she asked, the words more of a challenge than a question. Her gaze remained fixed on the embers, unwilling to meet his eyes. It was easier this way—keeping the distance, keeping the silence between them.

Tommy didn't answer right away. The seconds stretched on like minutes, the silence between them growing heavy. His gaze, she could feel it now, trained on her with a sharpness that sliced through the air like a blade. She could almost hear the thoughts running behind his eyes—calculating, weighing, assessing.

And then, in a movement so slow it almost seemed deliberate, he stepped forward, his boots quiet on the floorboards. He didn't sit down. He didn't touch her. He didn't have to. His presence was enough, enough to make her skin prickle, enough to make her pulse race.

"You think I'm going to let you destroy everything?" Tommy's voice was quieter now, and it sent a shiver down her spine. His words weren't angry—they were something far more dangerous. They were calm. Controlled. But there was a dark thread running through them that she couldn't ignore.

Ruth's fingers curled into the fabric of her dress, clenching until her knuckles went white. "It's already destroyed," she said, her voice barely above a whisper. "There's nothing left to save."

Tommy's gaze flicked to the fire for a moment, as though considering her words. When he spoke again, his voice was low but firm, filled with a weight that made her feel like the walls were closing in on her.

"It's not about saving it, Ruth," he said, his words like a slow drip of poison. "It's about control. And right now, you're playing a dangerous game. You think you're in charge. You think you're pulling the strings. But you're not. Not yet. Not until you understand what you've walked into."

Her heart was pounding now, her chest tight with the sting of his words. She wanted to argue, to shout that she had it under control, that she had always had it under control. But deep down, Ruth knew he was right. She had no idea what she was dealing with.

The silence stretched between them again, the weight of the moment pressing in on her. She knew she was walking a fine line. One misstep, one wrong move, and everything she had worked for could come crashing down around her. The Boswells, Tommy's men, even McCall's threats—they all had their sights on her now. She wasn't sure who would get to her first.