For a few moments he just holds me, like he’s trying to memorize the feeling of my body against his, then with one last slow breath into my hair, he steers me toward the table.
I love that I don’t feel the need to fill the silence between us. After we finish eating, we move to our usual corner of the living room.
Before I can sit on the sofa, he gestures for me to wait.
He lights the fireplace, sets my hot chocolate within reach, and then sits in the corner where I would normally settle, making room for me between his legs.
I lean back against his chest, resting my head on him, and he draws a blanket over us both.
It’s comfortable. It’s warm.
I don’t last fifteen minutes before I’m pulled under into a deep, dreamless sleep.
I don’t know how long I sleep. I only know that at some point I wake up in his bed, alone, with a small note on the pillow beside me.
Above it sits a key, and my heart swells all over again at the gesture.
It isn’t a declaration of love. But it’s something made official, and I can’t help smiling as I run my hand over the small piece of metal.
Three days, Amalia. You can last three days without him.
Ican still smell chocolate and lilac in the air. The thought crosses my mind that maybe I could have delayed this trip, because the image of her, so vulnerable in my bed, made me feel something I haven’t felt since Dean died.
Andreas has recovered from the bullet wound, and now that I know the man responsible for killing my brother is in the same city as me, my skin crawls. The problem is that we still don’t know what business he has here or where the fuck he’s hiding, since he’s been extra cautious. It feels like he has someone on call, deleting every trace of him.
The simple fact that he’s in the same city asherunsettles me in a way I can’t shake.
Six times we’ve come close to catching him, and every time I’ve imagined what it will feel like when I put a bullet between his eyes. I know he has ties to the Russian mafia and that a mission like that will probably get me killed, but it’s a promise I made to Dean. It’s the only way I’ll be able to go back to Sebastian and Karina with something resembling peace in my chest.
While Andreas works on locating him, finding out where he’s staying and what business he has in Mexico, I have to fly to Pennsylvania on short notice. I don’t pay attention when the landscape changes or the exact moment I park in front of their house, but when I see Karina’s eyes, I know I was right to come.
“Hey. What happened?”
When she called yesterday at noon and asked me to come, she wouldn’t say why, but I know she wouldn’t have called without a reason.
She gestures with a tilt of her head toward the kitchen, and I know immediately that Seb isn’t home, otherwise he’d already be here, ready to show me whatever he’s built since my last visit.
The kitchen smells of linden flower tea, and Karina’s restlessness makes my own foot tap against the floor without meaning to.
“One of the older boys at Seb’s school broke into the principal’s office and looked through the children’s files.”
I listen, trying to understand what makes this so serious, when it lands.
“Including Sebastian’s.”
“Yes.” It’s the fragility in her voice that makes me go to her and pull her into my arms.
“Karina, we always knew someone would find out eventually.”
I let her cry, let her release it into my arms, while I rub her back slowly.
From the moment we found out about Sebastian, everything I’ve done has been aimed at protecting him. Emotionally, financially, and most importantly, legally.
“He was so upset, but I wanted you to be here when we tell him the truth,” she whispers between breaths.
“Where is he now?” I ask, not letting go.
Because I feel the guilt of not being here for him always, of not being the constant he needs me to be sometimes.
