“Yeah.”
As the space between us grew silent, Harper hummed softly beside me, already half-asleep again, while the movie’s credits were rolling.
He looked at her, then back at me, his voice low. “You really held everything together while I was gone.”
I shook my head. “We just kept things warm until you came back.”
His eyes lingered on me, almost as if he was searching for something. “You did more than that, Darlin’.”
I didn’t trust myself to ask what he meant.
So I stayed quite as he stood, gently lifting Harper from my side. She sighed and melted into his arms, her tiny fingers curling in his shirt.
Something in my chest caught at the sight of the way he held her like she was the whole world, the reverence in the gesture.
He carried her down the hall, and I watched them disappear into her room.
For a long time, I sat there, the tea cooling in my hands, the flicker of the TV washing soft light across the room.
I felt him return, before he even spoke, almost as if my body recognized his proximity before I did.
“She’s asleep,” he said softly.
“Good. She played hard today,” I said.
He smiled faintly, sitting back down beside me.
We sat there for a while, neither of us speaking, just breathing in sync with the hum of the heater and the soft rain starting outside.
Finally, he said, “I missed this.”
“This?”
He gestured vaguely to the couch, the blankets, the lived-in quiet. “All of it. Her. Home. You.”
My heart stuttered. I wanted to say something clever, something light to deflect the way his gaze anchored me. But the words wouldn’t come.
So I just said, “We missed you, too.”
He smiled, small and real. “Guess that makes us even.”
And for the first time that night, the pain faded to something dull and distant.
Because sitting there, wrapped in warmth and the gentle rhythm of him beside me, I realized something I hadn’t wanted to admit until now:
It didn’t hurt just because of the flare-up.
It hurt because, somehow, my heart was waking up again.
Chapter 22
Logan
Later that night, the house eased itself into the kind of calm that only follows a long day: TV muted, rain tapping against the windows, the faint hum of the dishwasher still running in the kitchen.
Harper was asleep in her room, safe and tucked under the covers. Dani, on the other hand, lingered at the edge of restlessness, somewhere between exhaustion and pain. I could feel it, her restlessness pulling at me even before I stepped into the hall.
I felt it as soon as I stepped into the hallway after tossing my clothes in the wash. That soft, uneven breathing, a sound she likely didn’t even realize she was making.
