I couldn't sleep—too many thoughts, too much rage with nowhere to go—so I wandered the house like a ghost, ending up in the east wing before I realized where I was going. The wing where Woolworth died. The wing that's been locked since the gala, preserved like a crime scene.
I stood outside those doors for a long time, thinking about the man I killed and the woman who watched me do it. Thinking about how much has changed since that night, and how much hasn't.
Then I heard movement downstairs and followed it to the kitchen.
She's standing at the counter in one of my shirts—just the shirt, her legs bare beneath the hem—eating crackers straight from the box. She doesn't hear me approach; she's too focused on the food, stuffing crackers into her mouth with a desperation that seems almost frantic.
"Hungry?"
She whirls around, crumbs scattering, her face flushing with embarrassment. "Gabriel. I didn't—I thought you were asleep."
"Couldn't sleep." I move closer, studying her in the dim light. "Neither could you, apparently."
"I woke up starving. I don't know why—I had dinner, but suddenly I just..." She gestures helplessly at the crackers. "I couldn't stop thinking about food."
I file this away with the other observations I've been making. The tiredness. The pallor. The way she refused coffee this morning, according to Mrs. Bloom. The mood swings, the distance, the strange hungers.
Something is different about her. Something beyond the secret she's keeping.
"Come to bed," I say.
"Gabriel—"
"Not for that." Though even as I say it, I want her. I always want her. "Just to sleep. I don't like waking up without you."
The confession slips out before I can stop it—more vulnerable than I intended, more honest than I usually allow myself to be. She looks at me with an expression I can't read, the cracker box still clutched in her hands.
"Okay," she says finally. "Let me just..."
She puts the crackers away, wipes her hands on a towel, follows me up the stairs. Her body is warm against mine as we settle into bed, her head on my chest, her breathing slowly evening out.
But she doesn't relax. Not fully. There's a tension in her muscles, a guardedness that wasn't there before.
What did he tell you?I want to ask.What lies has he poured into your ear? What secrets do you think he knows that I don't?
Instead, I hold her and stare at the ceiling, listening to the rhythm of her breath.
She's hiding something. I'm certain of it now. The question is whether to confront her directly or let it play out, give her enough rope to either hang herself or prove that I can trust her after all.
Neither option appeals to me. Both feel like losses waiting to happen.
But there's something else nagging at me too—something beyond the Zach situation, beyond the secrets and lies. Something physical that I can't quite identify.
The smell of her has changed. Subtle, barely noticeable, but there. A sweetness beneath her usual scent, something richer and more complex. And her body—I've memorized every inch of her by now, and something is different. Her breasts seem fuller, more sensitive when I touch them. Her waist has a softness it didn't have before.
I'm probably imagining it. Projecting my anxiety onto her physical form, seeing changes that aren't there.
But the observations lodge in my mind anyway, waiting to be understood.
She shifts in my arms, murmuring something I can't make out, and I tighten my grip on her instinctively.
Mine, I think.Whatever happens, whatever secrets you're keeping, you're still mine.
But even as I think it, I know that possession isn't the same as trust. And trust, once broken, is almost impossible to rebuild.
I don't know what Zach told her. I don't know what she's planning. I don't know if the woman in my arms is still the woman I thought I knew, or if she's already begun the slow process of turning against me.
But I know one thing with absolute certainty: I'm not going to lose her.
