Sloane turned her face into Catherine’s hair, pressing a kiss to her temple. Her lips lingered.
“Still with me?” she asked, her voice low, velvety, unsure.
Catherine inhaled slowly, deeply, letting the scent of Sloane—the faint trace of lavender soap and sweat and something impossibly warm—fill her lungs.
Her voice was hushed when it came. “Always.”
She had chosen to stay. Not out of obligation.
But because she wanted to.
Because she was ready.
Because love, finally, didn’t feel like something she had to earn.
“I love you,” Catherine whispered.
“I love you, too.” Sloane’s hazel eyes were full of warmth and Catherine felt the squeeze of Sloane’s hand on her hip.
Catherine stirred just after dawn. Not with urgency, not startled by a nightmare or a restless memory, but slowly, softly, as if her body had finally remembered what it meant to rest.
The condo was still. The first hint of sunlight slipped through the edge of the curtains, painting the bedroom in aquiet gradient of amber and gold. In that light, everything looked softer, less like a space built for solitude, and more like something lived in. Something shared.
Sloane was still there.
Lying on her side, bare shoulders rising and falling in a slow, even rhythm. Her hair was tousled, one arm curled under the pillow, the other draped across Catherine’s hip like it had always belonged there.
Catherine didn’t move.
She didn’t want to break whatever spell had settled between them. She just lay there, her forehead against Sloane’s chest, listening to the heartbeat beneath her cheek.
For a moment, she tried to remember the last time she'd woken up beside someone and felt peace rather than panic. She couldn’t. Maybe it had never happened. Maybe this was the first time she’d allowed it to.
She shifted slightly, just enough to look up.
Sloane’s lashes fluttered, and then she blinked awake. Her lips curved into the smallest, sleep-heavy smile.
They stayed like that for a while, no rush, no fear. Just two women tangled together in sheets and something beginning to feel like hope.
Eventually, Sloane shifted to prop herself on one elbow, her eyes scanning Catherine’s face.
“How do you feel?”
Catherine considered the question. Her body still ached, and her heart was still healing. Her mind, always so full, so sharp, was quieter now. Not silent, but still.
“Lighter,” she said finally. “Like I stopped running, even if it’s just for a while.”
Sloane reached down and tangled their fingers together.
“You don’t have to run anymore.”
Catherine looked at her, really looked at her. She thought about all the walls she’d built, all the armor she’d carried, and how, in the end, it hadn’t protected her. It had only kept her from love.
“No,” Catherine said. “I don’t.”
There was a pause.
And then Catherine did something she hadn’t done since childhood, not with real intention, not with softness.
