Roxy didn't answer. She couldn't.
Her throat felt like it had been packed with dry sand. Her lungs were burning, not from a lack of oxygen, but from the sheer, crushing weight of her outburst.
If she opened her mouth to speak, she knew she would break, and then everything, the plan, the escape, the chance to see her children again, would crumble.
So she bit her tongue until she tasted copper. She squeezed her eyes shut, forcing the tears back, and simply stood there, trembling like a leaf in a hurricane.
When the silence stretched into an eternity, he nodded once. A small, jerky motion that signaled the final fracture of his hope.
He turned and swam out.
The heavy pearl doors clicked shut with a sound that felt final, like a coffin lid closing.
The moment he was gone, Roxy collapsed.
Fuck…
She scrambled up and dragged herself toward the membrane that separated the main bedroom from the Dry Lounge.
She burst through the barrier.
