“Very.”
A beat of silence stretches between us — tense, thick, buzzing with all the things we didn’t say last night. All the things we almost said. Almost did.
Then he exhales, slow and deep, shoulders dropping like he’s been holding tension all night and is just now letting it drain out.
“Good,” he says softly. “I didn’t want you to go.”
The confession is subtle. Barely there. But it slides under my skin like heat. I pretend not to hear too much in it. He pretends not to have said too much.
“Let’s get breakfast,” he says, pushing off the dresser and heading toward the stairs. “Crew stocked the fridge yesterday. There’s coffee, too. If the storm didn’t freeze the pipes.”
“Coffee sounds perfect,” I say, grabbing my sweater.
He glances back at me. Not at my face. At my throat. My collarbone. The flush spreading down my chest.
He swallows once, hard. “Yeah,” he mutters. “Coffee.”
We head downstairs, our shoulders brushing once on the narrow staircase — a tiny touch that sends a shock through me.In the bay, the fire truck gleams, washed clean by the storm. Sunlight streams through the tall windows, hitting dust motes like glitter suspended in the air.
Everything feels too bright. Too sharp. Too alive.
Ash moves around the kitchen with deliberate, controlled ease — like a man who knows exactly how his body moves in space and exactly how much of that space I’m occupying.
He hands me a mug of steaming coffee and our fingers graze. He doesn’t pull away first. Neither do I.
“You staying for the morning meeting?” he asks, voice calm but threaded with something darker.
“If you want me to.”
His jaw flexes. “I do.”
“Oh.”
He leans against the counter, watching me sip the coffee, eyes tracking my mouth like he can’t help it. I set the mug down too fast.
“I’ll help with whatever you need,” I say.
He inhales like I just hit him. “Yeah. I figured.”
“You did?”
“Lucy,” he says quietly, stepping closer, “you said yes before I even finished asking.”
My face burns. “It’s not a big deal.”
“It is to me.”
I look at him. Really look at him. This man who showed up in a blizzard. This man who held my hand in the dark. This man who hasn’t slept because of me. This man who asked me to stay without looking away once.
He’s staring at me now — steady, unfiltered, the way a man stares when he wants something but isn’t sure he’s allowed to have it.
My chest tightens.
“Ash,” I whisper, “I didn’t want to leave.”
His breath falters and his voice drops, low and rough and wrecking.
“I know.”
