“And after that,” he said quietly, “I knew something had to stop.Either I did, or I became something worse than even Vincent shaped me into.”
He didn’t look at me.He looked like he was bracing for impact.
“Why didn’t you stop?”The question slipped out before I could decide if I wanted to ask it.
His answer was immediate and ugly.“Because I was afraid.”
Not fear of death.Not fear of pain.Something worse.Something hollow.
“I’ve never been anything except what Vincent made,” he said.“And leaving meant admitting I didn’t know how to be a person outside of killing people for him.”
The fire filled the space while I tried to process the contradiction of the man across from me.The same hands that had tied me, fed me, shot my brother.The same mouth that had kissed me like it mattered and spoken my name like it hurt.
He leaned back slightly, the firelight showing every line of exhaustion etched into him.“But I’m leaving after this.I don’t know how.I don’t know where.I just know I’m not going back.”
I didn’t know what to do with the surge of emotion that hit me.It wasn’t forgiveness.It wasn’t hatred.It wasn’t sympathy.It was some impossible mix of all three, tangled into a feeling that made my chest tight.
I stood before I understood I was standing.Gabriel reacted like someone expecting an attack—tense, ready—then forced himself still.He didn’t move when I stepped closer.He just watched, eyes darker than the storm outside.
I stopped in front of him.Close enough to feel the heat from the fire and from him.Close enough to hear his breathing change.
“You can’t undo what you did,” I said.My voice didn’t shake.“You can’t make up for it.You can’t fix it.”
“I know.”
“And I’m still angry.”The honesty hurt.“I don’t know if I’ll ever stop being angry.”
“You don’t have to.”
“But I can’t only see the part of you that killed them anymore,” I said.Admitting it felt disloyal to everything I’d lost.“I see the part that hates what he is.The part that’s drowning in it.”
His breath caught.Barely noticeable—except I noticed everything now.
His hand lifted toward my face, slow enough that I could have stepped back any time.I didn’t.His fingers brushed my cheek, tentative at first, then steadier when I didn’t flinch.The contact sent heat straight through me—not romantic, not comforting.Human.
“I don’t deserve this,” he said.
“Maybe not.”My hand rose and pressed his to my cheek.“But I’m tired of drowning alone.”
He stared at me like I was something unreal.Something impossible.
“What do you want?”he asked.Soft.Afraid of the answer.
The truth formed before I had time to filter it.“I want not to feel alone.Even if it’s only tonight.”
Something broke in him—quietly, not visibly, but I felt it.He stood slowly, one hand still on my face, the other coming up to frame it.His forehead rested against mine.Our breaths mingled.
The world narrowed to heat and breath and proximity.No future.No past.Just now.
I didn’t know what would happen after.I didn’t know what this meant.I didn’t know if it meant anything.But I was so tired, so hurt, so unbearably lonely that the idea of turning away felt impossible.
I closed the distance.Not because I forgave him.Not because I forgot.But because grief and want are allowed to exist in the same body.
Because survival looks different for everyone.
And right now, for me, survival meant not being alone in the middle of a storm that had already taken everything else.
The space between the fire and the cot wasn’t far, but walking it hand-in-hand with Gabriel felt like stepping off a cliff.His fingers threaded through mine, warm and steady, and the cabin narrowed to that small connection and the sound of our footsteps.Neither of us spoke.Words would have dragged in everything waiting outside this moment—blood and orders and grief—and I couldn’t bear to let those things touch what we were moving toward.
