Her tears slipped over his fingertips, searing his skin like drops of scalding oil, burning straight through to his heart.

Overcome, he pulled her into a desperate embrace.

Stella crashed against his chest, her weight pressing directly against his fresh cuts, but he didn't feel a shred of pain-only a sick, twisted sense of satisfaction.

The deeper the physical sting, the more it soothed the agonizing ache in his chest.

Realizing she had slammed into his wounds, Stella gasped and shoved at his shoulders.

"Joshua, let go!"

But his arms only clamped down harder, holding her as if trying to fuse their very bones together, permanently etching her into his flesh.

"I'm sorry, Star," he murmured, his voice a gravelly whisper against her hair. "I can't let you go."

Even if it left him bleeding and broken, he would never release her.

Drained of the strength to fight, Stella closed her eyes and sagged against his solid frame.

The metallic scent of blood hung heavy in the air, and she had never felt more utterly powerless.

Outside, the night was pitch-black and suffocatingly silent.

After carefully applying antiseptic and bandages to his chest, Stella snapped the first-aid kit shut and looked up at him.

"It doesn't hurt," he offered quietly. "I know my limits."

A cold, humorless smile touched the corners of her lips.

"Am I supposed to applaud your precision with a blade?"

"..."

Stella stared him down, finally speaking the words she had been dreading. "Joshua, we're doing the hypnosis."

He held her gaze, his dark eyes resembling a bottomless abyss.

"Do you even understand what that means? I will forget you. I'll forget every single thing we've built."

Stella didn't blink. "If what you feel for me is real, then even if you forget, you'll just fall in love with me all over again."

"And if I wake up and don't care about you?" he challenged softly. "If I never fall in love with you again... are you still going to force this procedure?"

Stella hesitated, her eyelashes fluttering down to mask the sudden spike of terror in her eyes.

Reaching out, she intertwined her fingers tightly with his.

"As long as I care about you, that's enough."

Joshua let out a low, breathless laugh.

"Star, you are a terrible liar. A line like that might work on a child, but not on me.

I know exactly how my family's treatments work. Better than you do.

The second I go under, the last two years of my life will be wiped clean.

Every trace of you in my world will be systematically erased.

We might never cross paths again, or maybe we'd bump into each other years down the line.

Maybe I'd remember you, maybe I wouldn't.

And even if my memories did come back, do you honestly think we'd have a perfect Hollywood ending?

Human nature doesn't survive those kinds of tests, Star.

That's why I only deal with the present, not some hypothetical future."

A tremor wracked Stella's frame.

Laurel Quinn had warned her that a successful session required locking away the last two years entirely.

Selectively erasing just his triggers was impossible; Joshua was far too brilliant and would immediately spot,

the holes in his own miniSDO

.net>

He would inevitably realize he was missing twenty-four months of his life.

But Laurel planned to simply tell him he had suffered a severe relapse and required a hard reset.

Without any emotional tethers left, a

man as calculating as Joshua

l.ne

wouldn't bother digging into the void, knowing it could trigger another breakdown.

That was why every single memory of Stella had to die.

His voice pulled her back to the harsh reality of the dimly lit study.

"In the past, I didn't care enough about anything to mind if it got wiped away. But not

this time. This matters to me."

He leanedan, his gaze predatory and fiercely possessive. "I will not let

O you from my mind ne

And

want Tet you do it either."