The mattress dipped as he eased onto it, sitting next to her rather than lying down.His weight felt solid.Grounding.Real in a way the nightmare hadn't been, in a way the smoke and the screaming and the doors she couldn't find had failed to be.
"Put your hand here," he said quietly, patting his chest over his heart.
She stared at him."What?"
"Right here."He tapped again, the soft thump of his palm against cotton."Match your breathing to mine.It helps sometimes.Gives your body something real to sync with instead of the panic."
She hesitated, caught between the urge to reach for him and the years of conditioning that told her needing comfort was weakness, that asking for help was failure, that showing vulnerability was an invitation for someone to use it against you later.
But Colby wasn't Gavin.Colby had never been Gavin.And she was so tired of being afraid of things that might not even be dangerous.
She slid her palm over the soft cotton of his shirt.His heartbeat thumped against her skin, steady and strong, a rhythm that didn't falter or race.Warm.Real.Alive.
"In," he said.He drew in a slow, deliberate breath, his chest lifting under her hand."Out."
She followed his pace.In.Out.In.Out.His rhythm pulled hers along, patient and unhurried, until the jagged edges of her breathing began to smooth.The tightness in her chest loosened by degrees, the iron band around her ribs unclenching one notch at a time.
Her fingers curled slightly, catching in the fabric of his shirt without meaning to.The soft hairs of his beard brushed the backs of her fingers.She realized she was leaning closer, her shoulder brushing against his arm, drawn into his orbit by some gravity she hadn't known existed until now.
"Sorry," she muttered, starting to pull back.
"For what?"he asked.
"This."She gestured weakly at the bed, the room, the shaking that still hadn't completely stopped."Middle-of-the-night rescue.Again.You're going to start thinking this is all I do.Wake up screaming and need someone to talk me down."
"That's kind of my thing," he said."Middle-of-the-night rescues.I'm practically a professional."
She let out a sound that might have been a laugh if it hadn't been so watery, so close to tears."I didn't even smell smoke this time.My brain just invented it wholesale."
"That's because there isn't any," he said."Just my questionable laundry and whatever that candle is that Bree left in the bathroom."
Her mouth twitched despite everything.The tight band around her chest loosened another notch.
He watched her quietly for a moment, his dark eyes steady in the lamplight."You want to tell me what else that nightmare dragged up?Because I don't think it was just the fire."
She swallowed hard.Of course, he'd noticed.Of course, he'd seen through the surface to the rot underneath.
"Gavin," she admitted."He was in it, too.Not in the fire, but...his voice was there.In my head.The way he used to look at me when something went wrong.Like he was already writing the closing argument, already building the case for why everything was my fault."She pressed her lips together."Combine that with flames and screaming and doors I can't open and...yeah."
Colby's jaw tightened, a muscle flexing his beard moving ever-so-slightly."He's not here."
"He was on the sidewalk," she whispered."Today.This afternoon.He exists.He's real.He's in Copper Moon, and I don't know why, and that terrifies me more than the fire does."
"He does exist," Colby said, his voice going flat and hard in a way she hadn't heard before."But he's not in this room.He's not in this house.And he's sure as hell not in this bed."
Her breath caught."No.He isn't."
Her hand was still on his chest.She could feel the words vibrate under her palm, the certainty in them transmitting through skin and bone and muscle.Some of the heat rising in her cheeks now had nothing to do with panic and everything to do with the man sitting next to her in the half-dark.
"I hate that he's still in my head," she said."I left him years ago.I thought I was done.I thought I'd moved past it.But then I see him on a street corner, and I forget who I am for a second.I become the person he wanted me to be, small and scared and stupid, and I hate it.I hate that he still has that power."
Colby's gaze held hers, dark and intent."Who are you?"
She blinked."What?"
"You said you forget who you are.So tell me.Who are you, when he's not in your head?"
She opened her mouth to answer and found nothing there.No ready response, no easy definition.The question seemed too big for the moment, too heavy for the middle of the night.
