She steps back. Just one pace.
“I need space,” she says.
I nod. “Take it.”
“And you’re not allowed to disappear,” she adds.
“I won’t.”
Her gaze lingers on my mouth, then my eyes.
“This doesn’t mean I forgive you,” she says.
“I know.”
“But it doesn’t mean I’m done either.”
Something in my chest loosens.
“Good,” I say quietly.
She turns away again—but slower this time.
“Dax?”
“Yes.”
“You don’t get to write me letters anymore.”
I swallow. “No.”
“If you want me,” she continues, “you say it to my face.”
I don’t smile.
I don’t tease.
I just answer.
“I will.”
And for the first time since this started, I don’t feel like I’m losing her.
I feel like I finally stepped into the fire.
Chapter 10
Rory
The firehouse settles into a strange kind of quiet after midnight—machines breathing, lights dimmed, the storm clawing at the windows like it wants in. Valentine’s decorations blink lazily along the bulletin board, red hearts pulsing against concrete walls that have seen far worse than heartbreak.
Dax doesn’t touch me when we step into the empty bunk room.
He closes the door with his foot, gentle. Careful. Like everything he’s doing tonight is measured against the promise he made—to say it to my face, to let me choose.
I take off my cardigan because it’s suddenly too warm, then too cold, then everything at once. He watches me with that steady, unflinching gaze that’s always undone me. The firefighter who runs into flames. The man who wrote me into something braver than I thought I could be.
“You okay?” he asks.
