It’s unfamiliar territory. Exposed. Almost dangerous.
And neither of us looks away.
We lie tangled together, the urgency spent, breath slowing until it matches. Her leg drapes over mine. My arm is across her back, palm warm against her skin.
She shifts, fingers tracing idle patterns along my chest.
“Have I earned knowing your last name?”
Not teasing or playful.
“Bastien Montclaire.”
“Bastien Montclaire,” she says under her breath, testing how it tastes. “Very nice to meet you. How old are you?”
“Thirty-five.”
“I’m thirty-three.”
I smirk, amused she thinks I wouldn’t already have that detail. “Yes, I know.”
A pause. Then her fingers still.
“The way you moved… the way youended himwith your bare hands… where did you learn to do that?”
I draw a slow breath, weighing the truth.
“Green Berets taught me how to end a threat before it can breathe again.”
Her touch resumes, not retreating or afraid. Attentive.
“And the men you’vetaken care of. The ones you mentioned.”
This is the part I can’t rush or soften.
She lifts her head, meeting my eyes. “I need to understand.”
I don’t answer yet. Not because I won’t, but because once I do, there’s no going back to the space we were in before the truth.
I don’t look away when I start. If I do, I won’t finish.
“My sister’s name was Aimee. She was eighteen. Bright. Kind. The type of girl who believed people were mostly good.”
I feel it then—that familiar tightening, the old pressure behind my ribs. It never goes away. You just learn how to live around it.
“The boy who killed her was drunk. He forced her off the road and kept driving. There were three of them in the car. None of them called for help. Not one of them even checked to see if she was alive.”
The next words are a blade.
“She might’ve made it, but they left her alone in a ditch to die. It was hours before anyone found her.”
“I’m so sorry, Bastien. She didn’t deserve that.”
“No, she didn’t.”
Then I tell her the rest. “They were never charged because of who their fathers were. That’s when I stopped believing justice would always arrive on its own. I made sure they paid when the law didn’t.”
“That’s how it began?”
