Even if late.
My chest tightened slightly.
Late.
Because for a while tonight, I’d really believed he wasn’t coming.
And the disappointment had stung far more than it should have.
Which was its own problem.
You barely know him.
True.
But my body didn’t care.
And if I was honest?—
I didn’t, either.
Life had proven itself short in the most brutal way possible.
Rose was gone.
Conversations unfinished. Secrets unspoken. Opportunities missed.
What was the point of pretending attraction didn’t matter when it hit you this hard?
Still.
I wasn’t going to beg a man to come back.
But lying there in the quiet, adrenaline finally ebbing, another thought slipped in—quieter, more dangerous than pure lust.
What if this wasn’t just physical?
The question unsettled me enough that my eyes opened again, staring into the dim room.
Because yes, Kane was attractive. Intensely, unfairly attractive. The kind of man women noticed instantly. The kind of man your body reacted to before your brain caught up.
But that wasn’t all of it.
If it were, I would’ve brushed it off already. Filed him away as vacation chemistry. Grief-induced recklessness. A hot stranger in a foreign city.
Instead, he lingered.
Not just in my body. In my mind. In the quiet places where decisions actually formed.
I thought about the way he listened. Really listened. Without interrupting or offering empty reassurance. When I’d talked about Rose, about not knowing what came next, he hadn’t rushed to smooth it over.
He’d just … stayed.
Solid.
Present.
Like he could handle ugly truths without flinching.
