Page 215 of Silent Shadows

“You came back,” he said, shrugging. He said it like it was simple. One plus one equals two. Like maybe love wasn’t some impossible leap after all.

Maybe it’s all in the simple, small things. Someone learning your coffee order. Building shelves in your apartment because your organizational system is “vibes.” Texting flight times. Making room in the closet without making a speech about it. Believing someone when they say they’re scared and staying anyway.

He reached over and stole one of my noodles.

I slapped his hand, feigning shock as a smile tugs at the corner of my mouth.

He did it again.

I chuckle to myself as I think back to that moment. He stole some noodles; I stole his clothes off his body, and we fell back into my bed. My unnecessarily enormous bed. I’d find myself constantly reaching for him in my sleep. Quite the opposite of where we are now.

Sunrise spills pale gold through the bunk curtain. Dust floats lazily in the light.

Behind me, Miles shifts in his sleep. His arm tightens around my waist as if his subconscious had filed me into a color-coded, laminated folder labeled “important.”

His face is tucked into the back of my neck, breathing into my hair.

His glasses are crooked on the shelf above us.

My chest does that thing again. The thing where it aches a little in the best way.

Because somehow, against every instinct I’ve ever had, this became my life. Not tailored to an audience, but tailored to me. My apartment in LA has the plushest mattress, the softest sheets, the best plumbing—Miles was right about that—and the most accommodating doormen on the West Coast. This still feels more like home.

We’re in the middle of New Mexico this week. Owen’s leading this case. A rancher reported lights and a military presence. It aligned with some of Owen’s thoughts from Area 51, so when he pitched it, we all agreed.

Miles stirs behind me as Taylor and Maya keep bickering about expedition logs.

“Are they… fighting?” he says, his voice laced with sleep.

“Bonding,” I whisper.

He presses closer, squeezing me, and I turn in his arms to face him. He makes a sound that suspiciously resembles disagreement. “Five more minutes.”

His hand glides over my back. It’s a familiar gesture now, as if I belong to him and this moment belongs to us. The realization still catches me off guard sometimes. That someone can know the weirdest and ugliest parts. The parts people taught me to hide. The messy, defensive, emotionally avoidant, accidentally-too-much parts. And stay.

His eyes blink open slowly. The brown has amber flecks that always make my breath catch. He’s soft in a way he pretends not to be. Despite his methodical ways, I see the magic.

His hair sticks up violently. I thought I couldn’t love him more, but his disheveled morning self proves me wrong yet again.

“You’re staring,” he says.

“Your hair looks weird.”

“I heard a rumor that you like weird.”

The rumors are true. His mouth twitches. Then he reaches up and tucks loose hair behind my ear. Thumb brushing my cheek once on the way down.

It’s small and easy. My favorite kind of closeness.

“You hungry?” he asks.

“In what way?” I ask, an eyebrow lifting. He kisses me, softly. His tongue traces my bottom lip, and I part for him, a hand reaching into his wild hair, tugging gently.

“Get a room,” Owen growls from the bunk below us before stumbling out of bed toward the kitchen.

Miles ignores his brother, pulling back slightly to place a sweet kiss on the tip of my nose.

“For food, Bennett.”