He steps closer. Not towering. Not claiming.
Just close.
“You were the first thing that felt like something I didn’t have to survive,” he says.
My throat closes.
“You don’t get to decide what that’s worth.”
I blink hard. “I killed your wife.”
“You defended yourself.”
“She was still yours.”
He exhales slowly. “She hasn’t been mine in a long damn time.” He keeps saving that like it matters.
“But the title was.”
Silence hums between us, thick and dangerous.
Then, softer, he says, “Stay.”
Not a command. Not a demand.
A request.
“I don’t want you here because you got nowhere else to go,” he adds. “I want you here because you choose me.”
The words undo me because that’s the difference. He ain’t trying to claim me. He’s asking.
My eyes burn. “You won’t resent me?” I whisper.
“Not for surviving.”
“You won’t look at me one day and see her?”
He steps forward then and cups my face with hands that have done terrible things and somehow feel gentle.
“I see you,” he says. “And I ain’t going nowhere.”
I search his face for doubt. For hesitation. For the crack I was so sure would come.
It ain’t there.
There’s only him. Raw. Tired. Certain.
I unzip the bag slowly. The sound feels louder than the funeral.
“I’m not staying because I have to,” I say.
“I know.”
“I’m staying because I want you.”
His breath leaves him like he’s been holding it for weeks.
“That’s all I ever needed,” he says.
