He’s up there.
That thought knots my stomach. Not in fear. Not exactly. It’s something heavier. A twist of nerves and heat, fear and pull. The last time I climbed those stairs, I was half-broken. He carried me. Now I’m walking under my own power, but it still feels like a threshold I don’t know how to cross.
My palms feel damp. My pulse kicks up, restless and unsteady. A new kind of tremor starts beneath my skin. The kind that has nothing to do with pain and everything to do with him.
Every step creaks under my weight, betraying me with the awareness of what I’m doing. Knows what I want but can’t admit.
When I reach his door, it’s cracked open. Light spills out in a soft line across the hall.
I hesitate. Then knock.
The knock sounds louder than I mean for it to. It echoes down the hallway, a dare I can’t take back.
He’s already looking up when the door creaks open, watching with the patience of someone who’s been waiting. He doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t move. Just holds my gaze with that steady, unreadable expression that makes it hard to breathe.
He’s sitting on the front of the bed, elbows on his knees, legs braced wide in the stance of someone ready for whatever storm walks through the door.
Me.
Malachi looks built from sin and safety all wrapped in one. Shirtless, sweatpants hanging low on his hips, ink snaking down his arms with the movement of something alive. His hair’s damp from a recent shower, pushed back in messy waves. That tattoo on his chest, the one I always pretend not to notice, rises and falls with each breath. Calm. Controlled.
Everything I’m not.
“Couch is taken,” I say, voice too dry. Too casual. My mouth feels parched, the words scraping their way out.
He nods once. “I figured.”
“I’ll take the floor.”
“No. You’ll take the bed.”
“And you?”
He grabs a pillow and tosses it toward the far side. “Same as last night.”
My feet don’t move. I stay frozen in the doorway, trying to pretend this doesn’t feel loaded. That I’m not counting the inches between us, not imagining what it would feel to climb into that bed and stay.
I brush the doorframe lightly as I step in, fingers lingering where his hand once braced beside my head. The memory flickers, a warning and a promise. Some part of me seems to need an anchor.
But it’s just a place to sleep. That’s all.
My body aches—deep, soul-tired aching—but my chest is worse. My heart won’t slow down. Not with him looking at me in that way. In a way that says he sees everything I’m trying to keep tucked under skin and sarcasm.
“I’m not here because I trust you,” I manage. My voice is raw. Frayed.
His eyes darken, but his voice is calm. “I know.”
That should be the end of it. Should be enough. But it’s not. Because when I finally step inside, it feels like crossing a line I can’t uncross.
He doesn’t look away.
I gather the spare clothes Sloane brought up earlier, then head for the bathroom. Inside, I shut the door quietly, flicking the lock even though I know I don’t need to. I catch my reflection and wince. The bruises have bloomed deeper; shadows of what I survived. But my eyes… they’re quieter. Less panicked. Something inside me seems to have stopped running.
Just for now.
The mirror fogs slightly from the heat rising off my skin. I stare at myself, at the evidence. The fingerprint-shaped bruises that ghost across my biceps. The thin cuts are still crusted with dried blood. I trace one along my collarbone and flinch. I don’teven know which blow caused it. But I remember the feeling. The moment I realized no one was coming to save me. That if I made it out, it’d be because I saved myself.
I change fast—cotton shorts and a tank top that feel too soft against skin that still remembers being grabbed. The hem of Malachi’s shirt brushes the tops of my thighs. It smells of his detergent and something uniquely him. Sharp, dark, grounding.
