I should have walked away then.
Instead, I brushed my thumb once, just once, over her temple where her hair had fallen loose. A ridiculous, tender thing to do. The kind of thing I didn’t let myself do.
I hated how easy it felt.
She was still asleep when I left before dawn. I checked on Harper one more time, slung my bag over my shoulder, and stood in the doorway for a second that stretched too long.
I locked the door behind me and drove to the airport with the radio off.
Now, ten thousand feet in the air, the drinks from the night before long burned away, reality had sharp edges again.
I replayed the kiss. The way my hands had hovered, aching to pull her close, while every part of me screamed,Don’t. The way she’d looked at me, the feel of her skin under my hands, the smell of chlorine still clinging to her. She seemed so confident. So sure of what she wanted in that moment. How Harper had come padding into the living room at the worst, and best, possible moment, rubbing sleep from her eyes and asking for water like nothing monumental had been happening.
A sign, my brain insisted.
A reminder.
I hadn’t imagined the pull between Dani and me. I wasn’t that far gone. But wanting something didn’t mean it was wise. Didn’t mean it was fair.
She was young. She had a life that wasn’t complicated by grief and a six-year-old who’d already lost one parent. She deserved lightness. Options. A future that didn’t ask her to shoulder someone else’s history. She’d shared that she struggled with the pressures of her family, the expectations. Who was I to add more to that?
And I… I was tired. I carried too much. I’d learned the hard way what it cost to love and lose.
I rested my head back against the stiff seat and closed my eyes.
Elena’s face surfaced the way it sometimes did when I wasn’t expecting it; alive in my memory in a way that still hurt. A waft of her favorite vanilla perfume flickered through my mind, mingling with the ghost of her laugh. Grief had been a dark cloud that hung around me for so long, I almost didn’t know how to live without it. Especially when she barely had the chance to live. She should have been there for first steps, first days of school, scraped knees, and loose teeth. Instead, she lived in the spaces between what was and what should have been.
Loving Dani felt like tempting fate. Like asking the universe to prove its point again.
And yet.
I couldn’t stop picturing Dani in our lives. Weaving her warmth into the cold corners of my world, building memories alongside Harper, and threading laughter into the fabric of our days.
I opened my eyes and stared at the seatback in front of me.
I wanted to finish this job. Get back to them. Back to Sunday mornings and milkshakes, and laughter that didn’t feel borrowed. I wanted to see Dani again, to see if the pull was still there without the haze of beer and sunset and pool lights.
I also wanted to protect her from me.
The captain’s voice crackled overhead, announcing our cruising altitude. The plane leveled off, unbothered by the storm inside my head.
I rubbed a hand over my face and let out a slow breath.
I didn’t know what came next. I only knew that whatever line I was standing on, I’d already stepped close enough to feel the heat on my toes.
And that scared the hell out of me.
Chapter 34
Dani
I’ve been at this since seven this morning, but the case file I was reviewing in front of me was still only half-marked in red ink.
My calendar pinged with reminders for motions due next week.
This was unlike me; I was always ahead. Always on top of everything. I’d built my life around that, being dependable, achieving, and having my next steps planned. But today, I didn’t feel like myself. I felt anxious, like I was teetering on the edge. There was a restlessness vibrating just beneath my skin, making it hard to focus. I was disoriented, and a little lost, as if all the structure I relied on had slipped out from under me. And underneath it all, there was a thread of fear I couldn’t quite name.
My pen dug into the page until my knuckles ached, each line underlined with more pressure than needed. But I couldn’t help but believe that if I keep my hand moving, maybe I won’t feel the tight coil of thoughts pressing at the edge of my mind.
