Noah didn’t move. Didn’t speak. Just watched her with eyes that held seven years of silence and something sharper, hurt, maybe. Or anger. Or the kind of disappointment that made her stomach twist.
The storm cracked outside, a flash of white slicing through the bakery windows. Dust floated in the air. The old counters creaked. Everything looked exactly the same, and nothing felt the same at all.
Noah shifted, like he felt her looking. His jaw worked, a muscle ticking hard beneath his skin. For a second — one fragile, impossible second — it felt like he might say something. His lips parted, eyes flicking over her face like he was searching for the right words.
Avery opened her mouth too, the beginning of his name on her tongue.
But whatever lived in his eyes shuttered fast. He looked away, shoulders tightening, the moment collapsing between them before it ever had a chance to become anything.
The silence that followed was sharp enough to bruise.
He exhaled slowly, the sound low and rough. “Get some rest,” he said, voice quieter than the rain. “We’ll talk in the morning.”
Avery didn’t answer. Couldn’t. Her voice felt trapped somewhere behind her ribs.
Instead, she reached up, fingers trembling, and slipped the cut from her shoulders. The weight of it had settled around her like a shield, but now it felt like something else, like a truth she wasn’t ready to wear.
She held it out to him, her hands unsteady, her heart worse.
No words. No explanation. Just distance she didn’t know how to close.
Noah stared at the cut. At her. At the space between them that used to be small enough to step across. His jaw tightened, something flickering in his eyes, something she didn’t have the courage to name.
Then he took it.
His fingers brushed hers. Brief. Electric. Final. A spark and a goodbye in the same breath.
And when he turned away, the silence he left behind felt colder than the storm.
Chapter 3
Rook
The ride back to the clubhouse should’ve cleared his head.
It didn’t.
Rain slicked the pavement, spraying up from his tires as he tore down the back roads. The storm had thinned to a cold drizzle, but the wind still cut through his clothes, sharp enough to sting. He welcomed it. Pain was easier than thinking. Easier than feeling.
His breath fogged inside the helmet, hot and uneven. He cracked the visor open, letting the cold slap him in the face. Didn’t help. Nothing helped.
Avery Brooks.
Her name alone was enough to make his chest tighten, a slow, familiar ache he’d spent seven years trying to bury. Seven years of pretending he didn’t remember the sound of her laugh. Seven years of forcing himself not to look at the bakery every time he rode past. Seven years of convincing himself he’d imagined the way she used to look at him, soft and trusting, like he was something good.
And then tonight she’d looked at him like she didn’t know him at all.
His grip tightened on the handlebars, knuckles white under his gloves.
He was riding past the bakery like he always did when the storm hit. He’d recognized the beat-up compact before he recognized the woman inside it. Avery’s Aunt Clara had driven that car for years, and he’d jump-started it more times than he could count.
Avery was crying. Alone. In the rain. In front of Sweet Treats.
Her hair plastered to her cheeks. Her hands shaking. Her voice small and wrecked. The kind of broken that hit him in places he didn’t let anyone see.
He’d carried her inside before he even realized he’d moved.
Stupid. Weak. Predictable.
