"Hey." Trigg's voice is soft, closer than before. "Come here."
He doesn't wait for me to move. Instead, he shifts his chair closer and gently pulls me toward him. I go willingly, pressing my forehead against his shoulder as he wraps his arms around me.
"I've got you," he murmurs into my hair. "I've got you, Asha."
And just like that, every wall I've built crumbles. The fakeness, the pretense, the careful distance we've been maintaining…it all disappears. In this moment, he's not my fake husband. He's the only solid thing in a world that's tilting sideways.
I bury my face in his chest, my hands fisting in his shirt as I try to breathe through the storm raging inside me. He just holds me, his hands stroking my back in slow, soothing circles. Hedoesn't tell me to stop, doesn't tell me it's going to be okay. He just lets me feel all of it.
"She wanted to know me," I finally manage, my voice muffled against his shirt. "All this time, and he kept her away. He keptfamilyaway from me."
"I know." His arms tighten around me.
"Why would he do that? What else has he lied about? What else don't I know?"
"We'll figure it out." His lips press against my temple, and the tenderness of it makes something crack open inside my chest. "Whatever it is, whatever we find, you're not alone in this. Not anymore."
I pull back just enough to look at him, and what I see in his face steals my breath. There's no calculation there, no careful distance. Just raw concern and something fiercer, something that looks almost like...
"Trigg," I whisper.
His hand comes up to cup my face. "Yeah?"
His eyes search mine, dark and intense, and I've never felt more seen, more understood.
"Kiss me." The words escape before I can think better of them.
He goes very still, his hand freezing against my cheek. "Asha…"
"Please." I lean into his touch, my fingers clutching his shirt tighter. "I need?—"
"Not like this." His voice is pained. He shakes his head slowly. "Not when you don't know what you want. Not when you're messed up inside like this."
"Trigg, I'm asking you to kiss me." My hand covers his where it rests against my face, holding it there. "You're right. I'm lost. So help me feel something real. Help me feel anything other than?—"
His mouth captures mine before I can finish. The kiss isn't gentle. It's desperate and consuming, like he's been holding back for too long, and my words shattered whatever restraint he had left. His hand slides from my cheek to tangle in my hair, and he tilts my head to deepen the kiss. The move pulls a sound out of me I don't recognize, half sob, half moan.
I kiss him back with everything I have, pouring all my grief and confusion and need into it. I pull him closer, and when his tongue sweeps against mine, I forget how to breathe. He tastes like wine and something darker, something that's purely him. His other hand grips my waist, fingers pressing into my side through the thin fabric of my dress, and I arch into him, chasing more contact, more of whatever this is that's making my head spin and my heart race.
When he pulls back just enough to change the angle, I actually whimper at the loss. But then he's kissing me again, harder this time, more demanding, and my hands slide from his shirt to his shoulders, to the back of his neck, threading into his hair.
"Asha." My name comes out broken against my lips. He doesn't pull away, though, just kisses along my jaw, down to that sensitive spot below my ear that makes me shiver.
"Don't stop." My voice is breathless, needy, and raw. "Please don't stop."
A low sound erupts from his chest, one that I feel more than hear, and then his mouth is back on mine. This time, when he deepens the kiss, it's slower, more thorough, like he's memorizing the taste of me. His hand tightens in my hair, and the slight tug makes heat pool low in my stomach.
This is fire and hunger and years of complicated history burning between us. This is every argument we've ever had, every heated glare across a room, every moment of tension that I told myself was hatred but was always something more.This is real in a way nothing else has been, no pretense, no performance, just raw want and need and something that terrifies me because I don't know how to name it.
The sound of the back door breaks our kiss. We're both breathing hard. His forehead rests against mine, and I can feel his heart hammering beneath my palm where it's pressed against his chest.
"Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to interrupt," Dar says, her voice carrying across the terrace before she gestures apologetically to the table. "I left my phone."
"It's okay," I manage, my voice still breathless. She gives a curt nod, quickly retrieving her phone from beside her abandoned wine glass.
As she disappears back into the house, I let out a shaky breath and mutter under my breath, "Well, that was perfectly timed."
I feel Trigg go rigid against me. His hands, which had been holding me so tenderly moments ago, loosen their grip. When he pulls back, there's something shuttered in his expression, something cold that wasn't there before.
