Sitting in the driver’s seat, blond hair loose around her shoulders, face turned toward the porch light, both hands still gripping the wheel like she drove here on nerve alone.
For a moment, neither of us moves. She looks at me through the windshield.
I don’t call out. I don’t tell her to come in. I don’t move toward the car and take the choice from her.
I stand in the open doorway with the fire warming the room behind me and the porch light glowing over the steps. Waiting. Same as I did below the cliff. Same as I will do for this woman as many times as she needs.
Her door opens. One foot touches the gravel. Then the other. She steps out into the night, closes the car door behind her, and the sound feels like an answer.
“Hi,” she says.
It is such a small word for what it does to me.
“Hi.”
She walks toward the porch slowly, her hands empty except for the folded paper I gave her. She has changed clothes again, soft shorts and a pale sweater that slips off one shoulder. Her hair is loose, her face bare, her eyes bright with nerves and something braver than nerves.
When she reaches the bottom step, she looks up at me. “I almost didn’t come.”
“I know.”
Her mouth curves faintly. “You keep saying that.”
“Because I do.”
She glances past me into the cabin. I step aside, giving her a clear view. Firelight. Sofa. Table. Books. Boots by the door. My whole rough, ordinary life waiting behind me.
“I didn’t come because of the storm this time,” she says.
“No?”
“No.” She folds the paper once in her hand. “And I didn’t come because you kissed me until I forgot how to be sensible.”
“That happen often?”
“With you? Unfortunately.”
The corner of my mouth lifts despite everything.
Layla steps onto the first porch step. “I came because I wanted to see where you are when nobody is making me brave.”
The words go straight through me. I grip the side of the doorframe because otherwise I might reach for her too fast. “And?”
She climbs the second step, then the third, until she is standing on the porch in front of me. Her gaze moves over my face, then past me to the cabin again.
“And it looks like you.”
“That good or bad?”
“Both.” Her smile trembles. “A little terrifying.”
“That sounds about right.”
She looks down, and for one second, I think she might step back. Instead, she slides out of her sandals. Her bare feet touch the porch boards. Her toes curl once, but she does not hide them. I look at her feet, then back at her face.
Her chin lifts. “Useful, right?”
My throat tightens around a laugh that feels too close to something else. “Very.”
