Before her eyes drop to my mouth.
I should stop this.
She is scared. I’m half-feral. Jeremy has poisoned the whole day. August is asleep in the next room. Lottie just left, and something about her leaving feels off even if I can’t name it.
I should ask questions.
Instead, Amelia lifts my bandaged hand and kisses the gauze over my knuckles.
My brain goes white.
“Amelia.”
“I don’t want to talk anymore.”
Her voice is too soft.
Too thick.
There is something underneath it I can’t read.
I should read it.
I don’t.
She looks up at me, and all I can see is the woman who chose me on the counter, the woman who asked me to kiss her while she was scared for reasons that weren’t me, the woman who stood in my kitchen with keys in her hand and came back.
My woman.
No.
Not mine.
Not yet.
Maybe never.
But tonight she is looking at me like she wants to be.
“You’re shaking,” I say.
“I know.”
“Scared?”
“Yes.”
“Of me?”
“No.”
“Of what happens after?”
Her eyes flicker.
There.
Something.