“Positive.”
She studies me carefully, suspicious, like she’s waiting for a trap. When she finds none, something in her posture loosens.
“OK,” she says quietly. “Thank you.” The gratitude in her voice hits me somewhere deep and stupid.
She turns, grabs her bag by the door, and heads toward the bedroom. Halfway down the hall, she pauses and glances back.
“Hey.”
“Yeah?”
“I’m… glad you were here.” She looks away immediately, cheeks warming. “Not… you specifically. Just. You know.Someone.”
I don’t let myself smile too much. “I get it.”
Her expression softens. Just for a moment.
Then she disappears down the hallway, leaving her shadow in her wake, flickering in the firelight.
***
By the time she returns, I’ve spread my sleeping bag near the hearth, close enough to stay warm, far enough that it doesn’t look pathetic. I’ve laid out a second blanket for her in the bedroom and left the door open so she won’t feel boxed in if the generator gives up.
“OK,” she says, leaning against the door frame. “This is… surprisingly cozy.”
“I’m a professional floor-sleeper.”
“I believe that,” she says. “Your entire twenties were a mess.”
My mouth hitches. “Thanks?”
“Anytime.”
A silence settles between us, this one lighter. More bearable.
“Goodnight, Nate.”
“’Night, Ally.”
She closes the bedroom door almost all the way. Not shutting me out; just creating space. I lie back in the sleeping bag, listening to the storm and the generator’s uneven hum.
This is temporary. Just a blizzard. Just bad timing.
But the house is warm. The fire crackles. And a few feet away, the woman I’ve spent a decade trying not to need with every fiber of my being is finally asleep under the same roof as me.
My chest tightens painfully. This is going to be hell. Beautiful, quiet, impossible hell. But at least she’s safe.
For now, that’s enough.
CHAPTER 4
Ally
The cabin shouldn’t feel smaller just because Nate is in it. But it does feel like it’s shrinking around the edges. Every hallway feels narrower. Every doorway suddenly engineered for shoulders broader than mine.
And the bedroom is both too large and far, far too intimate.
When I slip inside with my bag, leaving the door open ajar, the quiet hits like a wave. The storm outside is still pounding against the cabin walls, but in here, the air is so still it might as well be holding its breath.
