I feel the brush of silk against my skin.
Then darkness.
The blindfold ties in place.
And I feel his breath near my ear.
“Good girl.”
His breath is still at my ear.
The blindfold is tight, but not painful.
It’s like losing one sense made every other part of me hyper-aware—of his nearness, of the silence, of the soft flicker of candlelight I can’t even see but feel in the air.
I don’t know what makes me ask.
Maybe the quiet.
Maybe the way his voice turns me inside out.
But I whisper, “Why do you call me that?”
A pause.
I think he’s not going to answer.
“I was stationed overseas,” he says, voice like gravel smoothed over steel. “Hot as hell. Dust everywhere. I hadn’t slept in three days. We were in a safe house, waiting on a call that never came.”
I don’t move.
I barely breathe.
“There was this crack in the wall. Barely anything. But out of it, this little butterfly crawled through. Tiny. Delicate. Could’ve been crushed by the heat, the boots, the fucking war happening ten feet outside.”
He shifts behind me. Not touching. But closer.
“I sat there watching it for two hours. Everyone else was passed out. I should’ve been too. But I couldn’t take my eyes off it.”
My heart stutters.
“It had no idea it was in danger. No idea it wasn’t supposed to survive there. It just existed. Beautiful. Untouched. Like it didn’t care the world was burning.”
He’s quiet for a second.
“You walked into that club tonight with eyes too big for this place. Soft steps. A dress you kept tugging at like you didn’t know how dangerous you looked.”
I suck in a breath.
“And I thought—fuck. She doesn’t even know.”
His voice dips, lower now.
Rougher.
“That she’s the most dangerous thing in the room.”
My chest aches.
