"Kian, are you dying?"
Her voice sliced through the silence like a sharp stone across bark. There was no dramatic inflection in her tone—just dry suspicion, laced with honest curiosity.
Kian turned to look at her, one brow arched slightly, lips pressing together in the barest flicker of amusement. His face didn't change much—Kian wasn't expressive like that—but there was something in his eyes, a shimmer of playfulness that hadn't been there earlier.
"Strange question," he replied.
Isabella tilted her head, hands resting on her knees as she crouched beside the tools, her gaze locked on him with narrowed eyes. "Well, you've been acting weird. Like… not 'you' weird. Warmer. Less shadowy and emotionally unavailable. You even made a joke earlier. What is that?"
Kian didn't respond. Instead, he sat still, legs crossed now, his elbow resting loosely on one knee as he simply stared at her with that calm, unshaken presence of his.
