I sigh. “I can’t exactly remove the groom from his own wedding.”
A small silence passes between us. The rain taps softly at the window. Somewhere in the house, a door closes. Everything around us sounds normal in a way that feels almost insulting.
Then Viktor says, “You’re shaking.”
I hadn’t realized how obvious it was.
“I’m tired.”
“That isn’t all.”
“No.” I look toward the door. “It isn’t.”
His gaze drops for the briefest second, not to my face this time but lower, toward the loose fold of the robe. I go still inside. Mybody almost reacts before I catch it. I want to put a hand over my stomach so badly it hurts.
Don’t.
I keep my arms exactly where they are.
When he looks back up, his expression is unreadable again. “You should lock the door after I leave,” he says.
I stare at him. “That’s it?”
“For now.”
The words should calm me. Instead they leave me with the strange, hollow feeling of standing on the edge of something much larger than this room.
He takes another step back, giving me space at last.
The distance helps, but not enough. My skin still feels too aware. My pulse is still unsteady. The kiss is still there between us, alive in the silence.
At the door, he pauses. “If he comes near you again tonight,” he says, “you call me.”
I almost tell him I don’t even have his number. But the point isn’t practicality. The point is the certainty in his voice. The fact that he means it. And the more dangerous fact that some part of me believes him.
So, I nod.
He leaves without another word.
The door closes behind him, and only then do I let out the breath I’ve been holding. I stand there in the middle of the room, handspressed against my ribs, trying not to think about how close that came. How close I came to telling him too much.
I’m too buzzed. I can’t sleep. I take my journal out of my bag and start writing. It’s something my therapist suggested to keep my anxiety away. Since I don’t have any family, and very few friends who actually check up on me, my journal is my only respite.
I write down everything about the encounter today, the way my lips still tingle.
How do I tell Viktor he’s the father? That’s so fucked up, especially now that I know he’s Ethan’s dad.
Ugh. I resist the urge to throw the journal away.
Tomorrow is going to be worse.
I know it already.
I wake before my alarm. Not because I’m rested, but because my body has given up on sleep.
The room is still dark, the estate quiet in that expensive, muffled way old houses are quiet, but my mind is already running. Breakfast on the lawn. Coffee service. Champagne, because apparently no one in this family believes in morning without alcohol.
That last thought makes me press the heels of my hands to my eyes.
