I shift gently, turning in the curve of his arm until I can see his face.
And when I do, my heart stumbles.
His eyes are closed, but not in that loose, open way they were last night. Last night, he looked younger in his sleep. Softer. Like the sharp edges had clocked out for the evening.
Now his brows are drawn tight, and the corners of his mouth are pulled thin. His jaw flexes in small, controlled movements that say he’s grinding through something.
“Rowan?” I whisper, brushing the backs of my fingers along his cheek.
My brain tries to offer alternatives. Stress. A bad dream.
Then I notice the light.
A thin line of sun has slipped past the curtain and landed directly across his face. It’s barely there.
He flinches.
It’s small, but it’s unmistakable.
His forehead tightens further as his fingers press into my side like he needs something solid to counter whatever just hit him.
Oh.
Oh no.
That familiar, unwelcome memory surfaces. The time in undergrad when he shut himself in his dorm room for twelve hours and claimed he was “busy.” The way he snapped at a classmate for talking too loudly in the library and then immediately went quiet, like he’d said too much. The way he once told me he didn’t get headaches. He got “interruptions.”
He has a migraine.
And he’s trying to outstubborn it.
I lift my hand slowly, like I’m approaching a skittish animal, and brush the backs of my fingers along his cheek.
“Rowan?” I whisper.
His reaction is immediate.
A wince. From the light. From the sound of my voice.
He doesn’t open his eyes.
But his jaw tightens harder.
And something in my chest squeezes so tight it almost hurts.
He didn’t wake me.
He just lay here.
In pain.
Because needing something is not in Rowan King’s operating manual.
“Oh, no,” I murmur. “You’re hurting.”
He doesn’t answer.
But I know.
