Her hands still clutch my shirt. My hands still grip her hips. Our mouths are still a breath apart. Her chest rises fast. Mine rises faster.
“Don’t go,” she whispers, soft, broken, trembling.
I close my eyes, forehead still touching hers. “I have to,” I murmur. “Just for now.”
She nods weakly.
I kiss her once more—slow, deep enough to make her knees buckle—because I need her to feel it. Need her to know we’re not done. Not even close. Then I lower her gently back onto her feet. She sways. I steady her with both hands.
“Briar,” I whisper, voice low, rough, absolute, “I’m coming back for you.”
Her breath stutters. “Promise?”
I look at her like she’s the only thing that matters. Because she is.
“Yeah,” I say. “Promise.”
I pull my shirt down and walk toward the medic. But halfway across the lot—I turn. She’s still pressed against the ambulance, shirt wrinkled, lips swollen, hair messy, staring at me like I just rewrote her gravity. And I know—I’m never letting her go.
Not after that. Not ever.
Chapter Thirteen
Briar
The sun isn’t up yet.
The house is quiet, the kind of quiet that feels suspended—like the world is holding its breath. I barely slept after what happened in the parking lot last night. After the fire. After watching Saxon disappear into the ambulance area, burned and bruised and still trying to look like he had everything under control.
He texted me at two a.m.
Home. Alive. Shower didn’t kill me. Told Rowan to stop hovering. Gonna sleep for an hour then check on you both.
I stared at that message until my eyes burned. I didn’t reply. Didn’t trust myself to because I knew if I answered, I’d ask him to come over. And if he came over, I wouldn’t let him leave. Not after that kiss. Not after feeling his hands on me, his body against mine, the way he saidI’d marry her right nowlike it cost him something to admit it out loud. I roll onto my side, staring at the sliver of pale pink that’s beginning to seep through the curtains.
Junie breathes softly in her little bed across the room. She didn’t want to leave my side after the fire, so we camped out together in my room, the air thick with smoke residue and adrenaline and all the fear I tried not to drown in. A soft creak from the living room pulls me upright.
My pulse jumps.
I pull on a hoodie, pad barefoot across the hall, listening. A low voice murmurs. Familiar. Warm. Deep enough to vibrate in my chest.
Him.
I freeze in the hallway, hidden by the corner.
He’s on my couch, legs spread wide, worn jeans clinging to his thighs, a black T-shirt tugged too tight across his shoulders. His hair is wet—must have showered again. A faint red mark traces his jaw from where Junie clung to him last night. He looks exhausted. He looks wrecked. He looks like the strongest thing I’ve ever seen. He holds a mug of coffee in one hand, elbow resting on his knee as he stares at nothing. Then I hear small footsteps. Junie wanders into the living room rubbing her eyes, hair a wild mess of curls sticking in every direction.
“Captain Saxon?”
Her voice is raspy with sleep.
His entire body softens.
“Hey, baby girl,” he says, voice low, gentle, stripped of all the authority he carries everywhere else. “Come here.”
She waddles straight to him—no hesitation, no shyness, no fear. Just trust. He sets his mug on the table beside him, and she climbs into his lap like she’s been doing it her whole life. He wraps an arm around her automatically. My throat closes.
“Why’re you here?” she mumbles into his chest, curling against him like a sleepy kitten.
