A quiet rumble moves through his chest, like a laugh he doesn’t quite let out.
“Maybe Mitchell is my father. But maybe he isn’t. We don’t know for sure. And I don’t want to spend the rest of my life fighting what I feel for you over something we’re not even certain about.”
His chest rises as he pulls in a deep breath, then slowly releases it.
I lift my hand toward the open doorway, gesturing out into the night beyond the shelter. “Out there, there are rules. Expectations. People watching everything you do. But none of that exists here. No one’s watching or judging us. No one’s here to tell us how we’re supposed to live. This island is ours. We don’t live in their world anymore.”
His hand comes to rest on my arm, moving slowly over my skin.
“Who’s going to tell us this is wrong?”
A beat passes.
“No one will know.”
His hand stills mid-stroke along my arm. “What?”
I lift my head and look up at him. “No one will know.”
For a moment, he just looks at me. He doesn’t answer, and the silence makes me push forward before I lose my nerve.
“We’ve been here for eight years. We could be stranded on this island for the rest of our lives. Are we supposed to pretend forever? Act like we don’t feel this? Spend every day fighting it?”
Even saying it out loud feels unbearable.
“That’s not living.”
I expect him to shut it down again, to draw that line and end this. But he doesn’t. He just stays quiet.
And the silence feels different. Not closed off this time. Not final.
Like maybe he’s thinking about it.
“This place has taken everything from us. We don’t have our family or our old lives. We don’t have friends, or anything that even looks like a normal future.”
Saying it makes the loss feel heavier somehow.
“No one our age should have to live like this.”
He’s still watching me, his expression unreadable.
“We already go without so much. I don’t think we should have to give up the one thing that might actually make us happy.”
He doesn’t argue with me. And that’s enough for me to keep going.
I reach for his hand and lace my fingers through his. He tightens his grip on mine right away.
“I’m in love with you, Dane. And you’re in love with me.”
I lift my hand to his face, fingers brushing along the rough edge of his facial hair. My thumb drifts to his lips, tracing the shape, and I feel the faint hitch in his breath.
“I want to kiss you until I can’t breathe. And I want to feel you. Not just this, not just holding hands.” I hesitate for a breath. “I want all of you.”
His body goes tight beneath my touch, every muscle drawn taut.
For a second, nothing happens. And then something in him snaps.
His mouth is on mine before I can draw a full breath. The force of it drives me back into the mat. He kisses me like a man who knows only one language—hunger. The kind that is deep, hard, and furious with want.
