Eventually, he rolled to the side, collapsing onto his back, one arm still hooked loosely around my waist like he couldn’t quite let go.
Silence settled between us. Not the screaming silence of the lobby, or the brittle one at breakfast. This was heavier. Softer. Like a blanket I didn’t want but couldn’t shake off.
I stared at the ceiling, catching my breath.
This is what it could have been, whispered a traitorous voice in my head.If he hadn’t vanished. If he’d chosen you and the truth instead of?—
“Don’t,” I told myself under my breath.
“Don’t what?” he asked, voice low and hoarse.
“Don’t talk to me,” I said.
He was quiet for a beat. “That’s going to make pillow talk awkward.”
I almost laughed. Almost.
“This isn’t pillow talk,” I said. “This is … stress relief.”
He hummed, fingers tracing idle patterns on my hip. “If you say so.”
I should’ve pushed his hand away. Instead, I let it rest there, heavy and warm, grounding me in a body I wasn’t sure I trusted anymore.
What if it had been different?the same voice pressed.What if he’d kept his promise?
A version of my life flickered across my mind like a documentary montage—stories written without that particular scar in the middle of them, a heart less guarded.
Maybe in that version, I didn’t walk into every new assignment already braced for betrayal.
Maybe in that version, we didn’t meet in a hotel room like this, full of anger and history.
Maybe.
But this was the version I had.
I rolled away from him, putting a few inches of space between our bare skin. It felt like miles.
“I need a shower,” I said.
He didn’t argue.
I slid out of bed, muscles trembling in ways that had nothing to do with cardio and everything to do with him. I found mytank on the floor, pulled it on, then stepped into the bathroom, closing the door behind me.
I turned on the shower and leaned both hands on the sink, staring at my reflection in the mirror. My hair was wild. My lips were swollen. There was a faint mark on my throat that hadn’t been there before.
“Idiot,” I told myself.
The water steamed up the room. I stood under it longer than I needed to, letting it pound against my skin, trying to rinse away the way his hands had felt, the sound of his voice in my ear when I’d come undone around him.
It didn’t work.
When I finally stepped out, wrapped in a towel, my phone was buzzing on the bathroom counter where I’d left it.
Unknown number. D.C. area code.
My journalist gut kicked in.
I swiped to open the message.
