The rooftop air turned colder the moment Lina stepped out.
She wasn't dressed for drama—no makeup, no designer coat, no polished words. But the storm in her eyes said everything.
Selene turned slowly, her expression unreadable.
"Well," she said softly, "I wondered how long it would take you to stop hiding behind messages."
Lina ignored the jab. Her eyes flicked to Kairo, then back to Selene. "You shouldn't be near him."
"Why?" Selene asked, stepping forward. "Because I know how this ends? Or because I don't play by your version of the truth?"
"You're not here for closure," Lina snapped. "You're here for revenge. Don't pretend you're the one trying to protect him."
Selene's jaw tightened. "You disappeared and left him broken. You have no right to act like his savior now."
"I left because I was being watched," Lina shot back. "Because after Maren vanished, I started receiving messages. And then—photos. Photos of me and Kairo. Of every girl he dated after me. Someone was collecting them."
Selene didn't flinch.
"I know," she said. "Because I was collecting them."
The rooftop went silent. Kairo froze.
"What?" he said, barely able to get the word out.
Selene looked at him now. Her eyes weren't cold. They were tired. "I wanted answers. I wanted to see the pattern. How you look at them. How they fall for you. And how it always ends the same."
"You were following me?" Kairo whispered. "All this time?"
Lina moved closer to him, protective. "I told you she was dangerous."
Selene scoffed. "And what are you, Lina? The girl who loved him and ran away? You think you're different from the others just because you came back?"
"I didn't come back for you," Lina said. "I came back because he deserves to know the whole truth."
Kairo took a step back from both of them. His heart pounded against his ribs like it was trying to escape.
"I don't want to be someone's experiment," he said quietly. "I don't want to be someone's guilt trip either."
Selene's voice softened. "Then be someone who chooses. For once. Not just someone who drifts from heart to heart like you don't leave wreckage behind."
That hit harder than either of them expected.
Lina took his hand. "You don't have to stay in this cycle, Kairo. We can walk away. Together."
Selene stepped forward. "Or you can face it. With me. With the truth."
Kairo looked between them.
Two paths.
Two histories.
Two possible futures.
And no more time to stay in between.
Selene never used to believe in fate.
Not until the night she found her sister's journal.
She was seventeen when Maren stopped coming home. Everyone called it a phase. A love-drunk getaway. He'll forget her, they said. She'll come back when she's done being foolish.
But she never did.
Selene remembered the police report. The unanswered calls. The final text Maren sent that said, "I think I finally found someone worth being seen by."
His name?
Kairo Reyes.
Selene didn't go after him out of curiosity. She went after him because Maren disappeared loving him. And because no one seemed to blame him for it.
She spent two years tracing threads. Interviews. Photos. Quiet whispers in girls' bathrooms. She wasn't stalking him—she was studying him.
And the strange thing?
Every girl who came into Kairo's life left worse than they arrived.
Some faded. Some broke. Some changed in ways that didn't make sense.
And yet he never knew. He never noticed the trail of sadness behind his smile.
So Selene made a plan.
Get close.
Get chosen.
Get answers.
But the moment he pointed his camera at her, something cracked. Because for the first time… she understood Maren.
Kairo wasn't just charming. He wasn't a player. He was dangerous in a way he didn't even realize—because he made people believe in love. Real love. The kind that exposes every raw part of you.
And once he captured it, he moved on. Not out of malice.
But because he didn't know what to do with hearts handed to him so freely.
Selene didn't know when the plan stopped being a plan.
But now, standing on that rooftop, staring at the man she both blamed and wanted to save, she realized…
She was no longer trying to ruin him.
She was trying to understand him before he ruined himself.