Unable to speak.
Because if I open my mouth, I'll start crying again.
And I'm so tired of crying.
I wilt.
That's the only word for what happens to my posture as I sit on this stranger's couch with my hands folded in my lap like some demented finishing school dropout who forgot the most important rule:wear clothes to kidnappings.
I'm naked.
Fully, completely, spectacularlynakedin a cabin somewhere in rural Pennsylvania with a man I don't know who's been giving me the philosophical breakdown of my life choices like he's guest-lecturing at a university I didn't apply to.
And the worst part—the absoluteworstpart—is that I stopped noticing I was naked about twenty minutes ago becauseapparently my brain has decided that emotional vulnerability is more mortifying than physical nudity, which says something deeply disturbing about my current mental state that I absolutely do not have time to unpack right now.
My shoulders curve inward, making myself smaller. A habit I thought I'd broken after Tyler but apparently it's still living in my muscle memory right next to "kneel when a man tells you to" and "count the strikes while you're being whipped."
Christ.
I really am a walking disaster, aren't I?
A case study in spectacularly bad decisions wrapped in a body that's been conditioned to respond to dominance with arousal instead of—I don't know—running.
Lorcan moves.
I freeze.
He crosses the small space between us and crouches down in front of me, his knees cracking slightly because apparently even hot Irish kidnappers with good bone structure can't escape the reality of joint deterioration, which is somehow comforting in a completely absurd way.
He takes both my hands in his.
His palms are warm.
Calloused.
Bigger than Giovanni's but gentler, which shouldn't matter except my traitorous brain immediately starts cataloging the differences like I'm comparison shopping for mob-adjacent authority figures on Amazon.
"Look at me,a stór," he says quietly.
I don't know what that means but it sounds pretty and sad at the same time, which feels appropriate for whatever fresh hell this situation has become.
I lift my eyes.
Meet his.
Gray like storm clouds over the ocean in one of those artsy Instagram photos where someone's standing on a cliff in Ireland looking contemplative and probably very cold.
"Hi," I say.
Because apparently when presented with an emotionally significant moment, my brain defaults to casual greetings like we're running into each other at Starbucks instead of having an intense trauma-unpacking session while I'mnaked on his couch.
His mouth twitches. "Hi yourself."
"So this is awkward," I continue, because clearly I've decided to deal with this situation through rambling. "Not just the naked thing—though yes, obviously the naked thing is objectively awkward—but also the part where you kidnapped me thinking you were rescuing me from my mob boss boyfriend except he's not actually my boyfriend, he's more like my... owner? Which sounds worse when I say it out loud. Definitely sounds worse. You're making a face. That's the 'this girl needs help' face. I know that face. Sister Margaret made that face at meconstantly."
Lorcan's smile grows. Soft and genuine and a little sad around the edges. "You always talk this much when you're nervous?"
"Yes. It's a defense mechanism. Words are my safety blanket except instead of being soft and comforting they're just..." I gesture vaguely with the hands he's still holding. "A lot. I'm a lot. People have mentioned this. Frequently."
