Ava's Pov:
I noticed the change before Leon did.
It wasn't anything loud or obvious. It wasn't like they suddenly started laughing together or acting like nothing ever happened between them. It was smaller than that. The kind of thing you'd miss if you weren't paying attention.
But I was paying attention.
Leon didn't shut her down immediately anymore. He didn't ignore her every time she spoke. He answered her questions now, even if the answers were short. And sometimes, he even asked questions back.
That alone was enough to tell me something was shifting.
I stood by the kitchen counter that morning, pretending to scroll through my phone while watching them from the corner of my eye.
Caroline was leaning against the island, talking about something she saw online. I didn't even know what it was about. I wasn't listening to her. I was watching him.
"And then it dropped by almost thirty percent in two hours," she said, sounding impressed. "That's not normal."
