Rafe’s gaze holds mine, steady.
I swallow hard. “I love you.” It’s not brave. It’s not enough. But it’s true.
He doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t joke. Doesn’t brush it off. He just leans in again, presses his face into my neck, and says it like a vow: “I love you too.”
The sound of it goes straight under my ribs, and I squeeze him tighter.
For a second, we just stand together in the open doorway, cold curling around us, the whole street quiet and unaware that my entire world just came back and stood on my porch with tired eyes and a beating heart.
Then Rafe lifts his head. His gaze moves to my mouth like he can’t help it. I meet him halfway.
Our kiss is immediate. Hungry. Relieved. Familiar enough to make my chest hurt. It’s not slow, not tentative, not polite. It’s the kind of kiss that saysfinallywith every press of lips. Rafe’s hands slide up my chest, fisting my hoodie like he needs toanchor himself. I grip the back of his neck, fingers sinking into curls, and he makes a soft sound that turns my knees weak all over again.
But there’s carefulness threaded through it, too, like a bruise beneath the skin. The kiss deepens and then stutters, not because we don’t want it, but because we both feel the weight of everything we didn’t fix before this moment.
We pull back just far enough to breathe.
I keep my hands on him, palms framing his face, thumbs brushing his cheeks like I’m proving he’s real. My chest rises and falls too fast. My body is buzzing, electric, as if I’ve been starving and someone finally put food in front of me.
Rafe’s gaze flickers over my face again. Then his eyebrows knit slightly. “You look different,” he says quietly.
I try to laugh, but it comes out thin. “So do you.”
He huffs something like amusement, something like sadness. “Tour’s over,” he says, voice softer. Like he’s trying to convince himself.
“I know,” I reply.
The unspoken words hover between us, sharp and inevitable: Now what?
Neither of us touches it.
Rafe glances behind me into the house, and his expression shifts. Not disappointment. Just… observation. Like he’s absorbing a new version of my world. “This is… you,” he says.
I swallow, suddenly embarrassed for reasons I can’t even fully name. The house isn’t bad. It’s nice, actually. It’s practical and roomy and warm. It’s a place I picked because the team recommended the neighborhood and because I needed quiet and because I couldn’t bring myself to choose something flashy.
But it isn’t our apartment. It isn’t LA. It doesn’t hold our history. It’s lonely architecture with clean lines and too much space in the corners.
“It’s… fine,” I say, hating how defensive my voice sounds.
Rafe looks back at me, and I see what he’s doing. How he’s trying to soften the edges of my shame without making me feel like I’m being handled.
“It’s nice,” he says gently. “I mean it.” His eyes flick down to my mouth again. “And it’s ours for the week.”
The words wrap around my ribs like a promise and a threat.
Ours for the week.
Notours, full stop. But I’ll take what I can get.
“Come in,” I say, voice rough. “Please.”
Rafe steps over the threshold. Once he’s inside, the door clicks shut behind him, sealing out the cold and the outside world and everything that isn’t us. He shrugs his bag off his shoulder, setting it down by the entry table. I stand there for a second like I’ve forgotten how to exist without distance between us.
He glances at the front door, then past me, his eyes flicking briefly to the small black camera mounted near the ceiling corner of the entryway. It’s subtle. Most people wouldn’t notice it.
He lifts an eyebrow. “Is that for me?”
Heat creeps up my neck. “Yeah,” I admit. “I want to make sure you’re safe while you’re here.” I gesture vaguely. “Extra alarms. Cameras outside. Motion sensors on the side gate.”
