She cooks. I eat. I love her cooking. I love her.
She doesn’t try to fix me. Change me.
She just breathes here. Leaves pieces of herself behind like breadcrumbs, leading me back to something I didn’t even realize I was starving for.
Home.
I can’t lose it.
I’m obsessed with my woman, my brothers say. They’re not judging. They’re happy for me. Logan is worried.
“Is it worth the risk?” Logan muses aloud.
We meet for a drink after work at Envy, a bar hidden inside Maddox Tower. Quiet deals get made in the dark here. It’s built for men like us.
We sat at the bar. The bartender sets down our drinks. He knows what we order. We own the building. We’re regulars.
I pick up the glass but don’t drink right away. Just stare out at the city below—still pulsing. Still restless. A living, breathing animal.
I don’t answer him because he knows what’s crawling inside of me.
No, it’s not worth the risk.
No, I can’t stop.
After a beat, Logan shrugs and slides me a black envelope.“It’s tied to the Remo fallout,” he says. “Some cleanup left. Loose ends.”
I down the drink in one shot.My throat burns. There is no absolution for me.
“I told her I quit,” I confess.
“I know.” There’s no judgment in his voice.
“I can’t.”
He just nods.He understands.My brothers are the only ones who can. We are who we are.We can’t unmake ourselves into something cleaner.Something better.
“You gonna tell her?”
“No.”
But the truth sticks to my ribs like splinters.
She’ll know anyway. She always knows.
She sees my soul. I see hers.
“You’ll be careful?” Logan asks—not a command this time, but a question, like he knows how much I’ve changed.
I nod once, still staring at the skyline.
I have changed. Maybe not enough. But enough to want to be the man she deserves, even if I’ll never fully be him.
When I get back to the apartmentlate, she’s sleeping. Curled up in the middle of the bed, wrapped in a down comforter, her face peaceful in a way I don’t think I’ll ever be.
I strip down, get ready for bed, and slide in beside her like I deserve to rest next to an angel like her.
I’m careful. I don’t want to wake her. I don’t want to break the spell we’ve built around ourselves.
