Page 19 of These Tears

He lifts a shoulder nonchalantly. ‘Not many people get to talk about questionable decisions and kinks on a Monday.’

An alarm blares between my temples. It’s a big change from the usual careful circling he does.

I slide warily down onto the chair as I study the restrained amusement on his face.

He picks up what’s been under his hands – the book I’d sent.

It crashes into me – he means what he read inside.

It was probably stupid of me to send him a book I haven’t read. And just because I’m not entirely sure what he meant, I go for honesty.

‘I have to admit – I haven’t read it.’

He hums low, a smirk spreading. There’s a beat of calculated silence.

‘And I have to admit I’ve developed a taste for chick porn.’

My mouth falls open. ‘Dark romance is literature with tension, plot, and actual character psychology.’

‘Still porn,’ he says with a smirk. ‘You’ve just wrapped it in paperbacks and trauma.’

‘Dark romance is psychology, power, dread and obsession – and yes, sex. In that order, if the writer’s any good.’

‘So… porn with footnotes.’

I exhale.

He turns his palm upside down and flicks a finger, beckoning me closer.

My brows draw together, a lick of coldness moving down my neck.

The chain fixed to the floor gives a short scrape when he shifts, a hard little sound that slices straight through he moment.

No one has yet seen fit to explain to me why Crane’s still coming into the visitation room restrained.

It shouldn’t matter – I know there are guards outside, cameras, protocols, all the layers they stack between men like him and women like me – but the sight of steel at his wrists drags back the reality in by the throat.

I shift forward before good sense can intervene. Curiosity always grips me first. Then fear. I hate that both feel good at once. Neither is safe, but my body apparently hasn’t received the memo.

At my hesitation, he cocks a brow. It almost looks like amusement, except I catch that small fracture of hurt beneath it.

His brow stays lifted in wait.

Two months of silence, aborted conversations and door closing between us lodge in my sternum.

‘Now, now…’ he murmurs, ‘you aren’t afraid of me, are you?’ The cadence of his voice might as well have come from a hearth. But he doesn’t blink once as he says it.

‘Chains ruin the whole trust-me angle,’ I say, trying for dry and landing somewhere breathless. But my eyes betray me, snagging on his hand, then his face.

The worst part is that the uncertainty isn’t only about what he might do if I obey. It’s about what I might do if I stop pretending I’m not already halfway there.

He hums, but it comes out as a growl. ‘It’s going to be hard for you to read from there.’

He opens the book, smoothing out the dog-ear, and watches me from beneath his brows. The crimson of the cover spills across the steel tabletop.

I should let the moment cool and go home to the shambles of my life. My quiet house, the half-finished rooms, the version of myself I’ve been trying to stitch back together.

But weeks ago, he barely gave me three words before calling George. Now he’s asking me to come closer.