Page 182 of Joker

“You also can’t back all the way off just because she hit a nerve.”

I know that too. That’s the problem. I know all of it and still don’t know where the line is between keeping her alive and making her feel watched into a panic spiral every time I tighten the net around her.

“I don’t know how to do both,” I admit finally.

The words feel ugly in my mouth.

Weak, maybe.

Shadow doesn’t flinch from them.

Neither does Blaze.

“Then you do what you’ve been doing,” Shadow says. “You keep her breathing and you let her yell at you when the fear scrapes her wrong.”

“That sounds shitty.”

“Yeah,” Blaze says. “Love usually is at first.”

I stare at him.

He lifts one shoulder. “What? I contain multitudes.”

The point lands.

Because maybe that’s all there is right now.

No perfect answer. No clean way through. Just staying in it long enough for both truths to exist at the same time:

She needs protection. She hates what protection feels like when it brushes old wounds. And if I’m really hers and she’s really mine and this thing between us is as permanent as I’m starting to think it is, then maybe surviving that contradiction together is the job.

Maybe that’s the whole damn thing.

I scrub a hand over my face and let out a long breath. “She said she knew I wasn’t him.”

Shadow nods. “Believe her.”

“I do.”

Blaze’s voice goes quieter than usual when he says, “Then believe the other part too.”

I glance at him.

He tips his chin toward the clubhouse. “Her body remembered. That ain’t the same as her heart doubting you.”

That one lands deep. Maybe because it’s true. Maybe because I needed somebody else to say it before I let myself fully trust it.

Either way, I stand there in the hot little garage with my brothers and the oil smell and the fan rattling in the corner, and I decide something.

I’m not backing off completely. I’m not crowding her either. I’m going to keep the net tight. I’m going to stop making her feel it every second if I can help it. And I’m going to let her come back to me on her own terms before I try to fix what happened with words that won’t matter half as much as consistency will.

That’s the best I’ve got.

It’ll have to be enough.

For now.

The next two hours disappear into work.