He’d felt it before. A different time, a different woman. Someone who’d once woven laughter into his days, slipped past his guard with soft touches and softer words.
But warmth faded. And loyalty—he’d learned—was fleeting. She’d drifted from him like smoke, lost to a brighter flame.
That memory, once razor-sharp, had dulled over time. Yet, even now, traces of it lingered—a quiet ache he’d long stopped trying to define.
“You don’t say much, do you?” Reiya’s voice broke the silence, teasing but not unkind. She glanced at him, blue eyes pale in the moonlight. “Especially when you’re not with Kaelen.”
Her directness nudged at something tender in him. His insides balked at it, and the urge to redirect the conversation clawed at him.
“I’ve never been one for unnecessary words,” he said carefully. “I prefer to listen. To understand.”
“That’s a rare quality. Most people feel the need to fill silence. To be heard.”
His gaze flicked toward her. “Silence isn’t always empty. Sometimes, it’s where the most important things are said.”
Her lips curved slightly. “Like now?”
Alarik watched her from the corner of his eye, catching the faint playfulness in her tone.
He gave a slight nod. “Perhaps.”
She didn’t seem to expect him to play along—the flicker of surprise in her eyes was too quick to hide. She shifted her weight as if to walk ahead, but her footing faltered. A loose stone rolled underfoot.
Before thought could catch up, Alarik reached out, one hand closing around her arm. Her scent crashed over him—heady and rich, like the first bloom after a storm. It rooted him to the spot, her warmth seeping into his skin where their bodies touched.
She looked up, eyes wide, lips slightly parted. And just like that, the night changed.
The world stilled—the warmth of her against him, the quiet rise and fall of her breasts, the way her gaze locked onto his. His fingers softened at her elbow, but he didn’t let go.Couldn’t.
The way she looked at him—eyes wide, pupils blown—told him she felt it too.
The pull. The tension. The unspoken question hanging between them.
For a heartbeat, neither of them moved. The fire crackled somewhere behind them, too far away to matter.
When she finally stepped back, his fingers slipped free, the absence of her warmth leaving an ache in his chest he hadn’t been prepared for.
“Thank you,” she murmured.
Alarik forced himself to take a step back too, tamping down the part of him that wanted to reach for her again.
“My pleasure,” he said, the words coming out rougher than he intended.
They walked in silence, but his pulse was still unsteady, and the air had shifted. The weight of everything left unsaid, light as it was, settled between them.
His gaze flickered toward her neck. The bruise stood out in the moonlight, dark and angry against her pale skin. His jaw tightened. The thought of anyone putting their hands on her sent something fierce coursing through him, something he barely had the name for.
She must’ve felt his eyes on her because she slowed, hesitating.
“Alarik . . . I wanted to apologize.” Her voice was barely above a whisper. “Earlier, when I stepped back—it wasn’t about you. It was . . .” She exhaled, words catching in her throat. Her fingertips ghosted over the bruise. “My body remembered things I’d rather it didn’t.”
Her gaze lowered, voice quieter still. “It’s not that I found your touch distasteful. Forgive me.”
Her words sent a rush of something dark and sharp through him—a visceral need to protect, to erase the pain woven into her voice, to burn away whatever ghosts made her retreat. His hands curled into fists.
He wanted to tell her there was nothing to forgive, that the weight of what had been done to her was not hers to bear alone.
Instead, he swallowed, measured his words.
