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After the messages.

After the words scrawled through The Phantom.

After I’d stood in front of him and given him every ugly piece of truth I’d been carrying… my sleeping body had still chosen him.

A slow breath moved beneath my cheek. His arm tightened around my waist. Not much. Enough. My eyes burned.

He let you into his bed.

I closed them.

No.

Into his heart.

Stop.

Why not his past?

My fingers curled against his chest.

Alaric stirred.

His hand moved slowly along my back before settling at my waist again. He didn’t speak. Neither did I. Maybe neither of us knew what there was left to say.

So I stayed.

Just for another minute.

Then another.

Pretending the warmth between us hadn’t changed. Pretending I hadn’t learned there was something beneath the study. Pretending I wasn’t already wondering what it was.

A knock sounded at the door.

Soft.

Once.

Alaric changed instantly.

His body hardened beneath mine. The arm around my waist loosened. I hated that too. Hated the cold that rushed into the space where he’d been as he carefully slid from beneath me.

He sat on the edge of the bed for a second.

Naked.

Head lowered.

Then reached for his clothes.

I watched without speaking. Trousers. Shirt. Buttons pushed through quickly. The man who’d held me through the night disappeared piece by piece beneath black fabric. Until Alaric stood again.

Controlled.

Guarded.

The Revenant.