The car door closed with a muffled thud, sealing off the ballroom's riot of sound. For a moment, Isla sat in the hush, still blinking against the last camera flash that had caught them at the threshold. The echo of it clung to her eyes like an afterimage, white and sharp, as though the night refused to let her go cleanly.
Inside the car, the silence pressed heavier than the music had. Leather seats breathed cool against her back, and beyond the tinted windows, the city blurred past in streaks of gold and white. It was quieter here, private, but not empty—her mind carried the noise with her, fragments of laughter and whispers and the impossible weight of a hundred gazes.
Tyler sat beside her, steady as ever. His hand rested on his knee, his posture composed in a way that almost looked casual, except for the faint line carved into his jaw. When she glanced at him, she caught the way he exhaled through his nose, slow, measured, like someone settling into relief after weathering a storm.
The kiss still lingered on her lips—not the warmth of it, but the meaning threaded through it. For him, it seemed to have been an answer. For her, it had been a question.
"Are you all right?" Tyler's voice broke the hush, softer than the hum of the engine.
She startled a little at the sound, then gave the smallest nod. "Yes." The word left her too quickly, too thin, so she added, "I just... didn't expect tonight to be so much."
His mouth tipped in a shadow of a smile. "That's putting it mildly." A beat passed before he shifted slightly, turning toward her. "But I think I did the right thing. Out there."
Isla's stomach dipped. She kept her gaze fixed on the window, watching the city peel past in mirrored glass and neon. "The kiss, you mean."
"Yes." He didn't hesitate. "They needed to see it. To know." His tone wasn't hard—it carried none of the edge he'd had in the ballroom. If anything, he sounded lighter, relieved, as though the weight had been lifted by the press of his mouth to hers in front of everyone.
She folded her hands in her lap, thumbs worrying over each other. "Know what, exactly?"
Tyler glanced at her, his eyes steady, but softened now. "That you're mine. That you're not—" He stopped, exhaled, rephrased. "That they can't spin you into something else. That you're not up for their games."
Isla bit back the urge to point out that being kissed in front of an entire ballroom was itself a game, whether he meant it that way or not. Instead, she let the silence stretch, her head tipped slightly toward the window. Outside, the streets rolled by too quickly, faceless crowds flickering past.
She wanted to tell him she hadn't minded the kiss—not the kiss itself. What unsettled her was that it hadn't felt meant for her. It had been meant for them, the audience watching. The claim had been drawn like a line in the sand, and she hadn't even been the one to put it there.
Tyler, though, looked calmer than he had all night. His shoulders, tense during the dances, had settled. His hand flexed once on his knee, then stilled. The storm that had built in him seemed to have broken and passed, and now he sat with the quiet satisfaction of someone who believed they'd done what needed doing.
The contrast tugged at her chest.
"You didn't have to," she said quietly, surprising herself with the words.
He turned his head, studying her. "Didn't have to?"
She forced her voice steady, practical. "Make a show. The people who want to twist things will twist them no matter what. A kiss won't change that."
For a heartbeat, she thought he might bristle. But instead, his expression softened further, not sharper. "Maybe not. But it changes what I let them say." His eyes stayed on her, unwavering. "It tells them I'm not stepping aside. That's worth something."
Her throat tightened, though she managed a small nod. She didn't want to start an argument—not here, not when he seemed calmer. Not when part of her understood why he'd done it, even if it unsettled her.
The hum of the car filled the silence between them. She shifted slightly, letting her gaze drift from the window back to him. Tyler's hand was close to hers on the seat, steady, patient. She hesitated, then let her fingers brush his.
His hand turned, catching hers in a quiet clasp. His thumb moved once across her knuckles, a gesture that felt different here in the privacy of the car—smaller, quieter, unperformed. No cameras, no audience. Just him.
The tenderness of it reached her more than the kiss had.
He didn't say anything else, and neither did she. The car carried them through the city, the quiet folding around their silence, until the lights thinned and familiar streets began to appear.
By the time Tyler eased the car to a stop in front of her building, Isla's thoughts still hummed with the contrast—the silence of the ride set against the ballroom's noise she hadn't quite left behind, and then the simplicity of this: his hand in hers, his thumb brushing lightly, like he was afraid to let go too soon.
Cool air spilled in as he opened his door and stepped out. Isla followed, the night air brushing over her skin.
They crossed the short stretch to her building in silence, their steps quiet against the pavement. The glass door reflected the spill of streetlights, casting their figures faintly back at them. At the entrance, Tyler lingered. His hand caught hers again for a moment longer, thumb brushing her knuckles. "You should get some sleep—you must be tired." His voice was soft, almost ordinary, but in it lay something like care.
She gave a small smile, answering without words. Then she slipped inside, the glass door easing shut behind her. The entryway was still, quiet, its small lobby dim under the overhead lights. For the first time all night, no one was watching. And yet, the silence pressed heavier than the ballroom had.