Not gently.
Not with space or grace.
Just—
air.
Cold, staggering air.
Savannah jerked back half an inch, chest rising too fast. Her lips still tingled — not wrong.
Just unfamiliar.
Different in a way she didn’t have a name for yet.
Her hands were still twisted in Tilly’s coat. She dropped them like she’d been burned, but it didn’t help. Nothing helped.
The truck cab felt too small.
The heater was too loud.
Her heartbeat too messy to hide.
Tilly didn’t move.
Didn’t retreat.
Didn’t apologize.
They just watched her — breathing steady, eyes dark, sure, still warm from the kiss like they were memorizing her face.
They weren’t rattled.
They weren’t panicking.
They weren’t second-guessing.
They looked… centered.
Settled.
Certain.
Savannah hated how much it made something in her chest twist.
The storm screamed around them, snow battering the windshield, but inside the truck it was dead silent for a long, long time.
Seconds.
Then a minute.
Then more.
Savannah stared at her knees like they held the answers to the universe. Her pulse was everywhere — in her throat, in her elbows, in the tips of her fingers.
She couldn’t think.
Couldn’t breathe right.
