“And Maisie?”
“Maisie was an inconvenience, a complication in the brand. We broke up by the time Maisie was six months old.” My voice grows rough. “I was terrified, I’d never spent any time around babies, but I figured it out. Sienna would show up twice a year with expensive gifts, make promises she never kept, then disappear again. Every time, Maze would wait by the window for days, thinking maybe this time Mom would come back.”
“Zayden...”
“I got full custody when Maze was thirteen months old. Sienna didn’t even fight it. She just signed the papers and posted a photo from Bali the next day.” I finally look at Tori. “So that’s my thing—I don’t trust easily. I don’t let people close because the last person I let in used me for my name and treated my daughter like she was disposable.”
The room is quiet except for the hum of the air conditioner and the distant sounds of the city below.
Tori shifts, propping herself up on one elbow so she can look down at me. Her hand comes up to rest on my jaw, warm and steady.
“We’re a mess,” she says softly.
I turn my head and press a kiss to her palm. “We’re healing.”
She looks at me like no one has ever said that to her before. Like the word is foreign, like maybe she’d forgotten it was even an option.
“Yeah?” she whispers.
“Yeah.” I pull her back down, tucking her against my chest, and she comes willingly, her body fitting into mine like she was made for this exact spot.
She’s quiet for a moment, her fingers tracing absent patterns on my chest. “Five minutes are up, lover boy,” she teases.
I tighten my arms around her. “Five more.”
She tilts her face up, and I meet her halfway for a kiss that’s softer than the others. Slower. “It’s already been twenty.”
I smile into her hair. “I’m bad at math.”
She laughs quietly, and I pull her closer.
I’ll leave soon. I will. Just... not yet.
• • •
The treatment room with the door closed is our other refuge.
Legitimate sessions—my shoulder still needs work, and she’s nothing if not thorough—that turn into something else when the last of the tension releases and her hands slow on my skin.
“You’re healing well,” she says, her voice pitched low even though we’re alone. Professional words, but her fingers trace a path along my shoulder blade that has nothing to do with physical therapy.
“Yeah?”
“Mm-hmm.” She leans closer, her lips brushing my ear. “Another few weeks, and you’ll be back to full strength.”
“And then what?”
“Then I won’t have an excuse to touch you every day.”
I turn my head and catch her mouth with mine. She makes a soft sound of surprise that melts into something warmer, and for a moment, we just stay there—her hands on my bare shoulders,my palm curved around her hip, stealing time we don’t really have.
“We’ll figure it out,” I say when we break apart.
“Will we?”
“I’m not letting you go that easily, Wells.”
She searches my face as if looking for the catch.
