"She does that," Caleb said from behind her.
"Hugs strangers?"
"Decides you're hers and acts accordingly."
Harper closed the door and leaned against it.The cottage felt different now—quieter, but not empty.The table was still covered in papers and napkins, and the documentation they'd been building for three days.The surveillance feeds still ran on the laptop in the corner.Caleb was still standing in the kitchen, watching her with that steady attention he never quite managed to disguise.
"She told me you watch me," Harper said.
Caleb's hand, which had been reaching for a dish towel, stopped.
"Lila," Harper clarified."She said you have the same tell as Ronan."
"Lila sees things that are none of her business."
"She said that, too.Approximately."
He picked up the dish towel and dried a mug that was already dry."What did you say?"
"That we're working together.That's all."
"And she believed you."
"No."
The kitchen was quiet.Caleb set the mug down and put the towel over his shoulder.He looked at her—really looked, the way he did when he wasn't trying to be careful about it.
"Harper."
"Don't."
"Don't what?"
"Don't say something we can't take back.Not tonight.Not with five days until Diana runs the story and a car sitting at the end of a road and everything we've built on this table between us."
He nodded slowly."Okay."
"Okay."
"But for the record," he said, and his voice was quieter now, stripped of the operational calm he wore like armor, "Lila's not wrong."
He let the admission settle between them—the kitchen counter, the table of documentation, the three feet of Florida tile that separated his body from hers.
Harper wanted to close the distance.She wanted to cross those three feet and put her hands on his chest and stop pretending that the only thing keeping her awake at night was the threat of Harrison Montgomery.But wanting and acting were different things, and she'd spent too long learning the difference.
"I'm going to bed," she said.
"Yeah."
She pushed off the door and walked past him.At the hallway, she stopped.
"Caleb."
"Yeah."
"For what it's worth, I'm glad you're the one who found me at that bakery."
She didn't wait for his answer.She went into the bedroom, closed the door, and leaned against it, heart hammering, and listened to the sound of him moving through the kitchen on the other side.Water running.A drawer opening and closing.The soft click of the laptop closing.
