The offer hangs between us. A redirection that feels… reasonable. Considered.
I exhale softly. “Okay.” The word leaves me without effort. And the second it does, something in my body settles. Completely. The decision is gone. There’s nothing left to weigh, nothing left to reconsider, nothing left to hold onto. It’s already been handled. His hand moves up my back, then down again in a slow, steady path.
“Good,” he murmurs. And I feel it. Relief. Immediate. Quiet. Like a low, constant tension I didn’t realize I was carrying has simply dissolved.
We don’t talk about it again. There’s no need to. The moment closes seamlessly, folding into everything else around it as if it never required attention in the first place.
I move closer to him without thinking. My body settles against his as if it’s the most natural thing in the world. His hand is already there to meet me. Steady. Certain. Waiting.
I exhale softly, letting my weight rest fully into him. There’s nowhere else I need to be. Nothing else pulling at me. The earlier thought—of going out, of leaving, of stepping back into that noise—feels distant now. Faint. Like something that belonged to a different version of me. It doesn’t hold the same shape anymore. It doesn’t carry the same pull. It feels unnecessary, unappealing.
I shift slightly closer, my body aligning with his without effort. And the truth settles in quietly, without resistance. I didn’t really want to go out, anyway.
Later, my phone buzzes from the couch, sharp enough to catch my attention immediately. I turn toward it without thinking, already shifting forward to grab it.
Soren’s hand closes around my wrist. The movement stops there. He doesn’t squeeze hard, but there’s no softness to it either. It’s firm enough that I feel it all the way up my arm. Enough that I don’t keep moving.
“Leave it.” His voice is quiet, but there’s weight behind it this time. No casual ease. No suggestion.
I glance at him. “It might be important.” The words sound thinner than I expect.
His thumb shifts slightly against the inside of my wrist, right over my pulse, like he can feel it reacting.
The phone buzzes again.
For a second, I hesitate.
His grip doesn’t change much. It doesn’t need to. “Sit.” There’s no edge to it, no raised voice, but it lands differently than before. Final. Decided. He doesn’t look away.
And I listen. I sit back down.
My phone buzzes a third time.
Loud. Sharp. Intrusive.
The sound cuts through everything.
For a second, my body reacts automatically, a small shift, a break in focus.
Soren stills, and the change is immediate. His hand leaves my wrist. The warmth disappears. The air shifts. Cold. The absence is stark. The loss of his contact hitting harder than it should.
Then it buzzes again, and even though I should be expecting it by this point, I almost jump out of my skin. My heart hammers in my chest, the shift in the room palpable.
He turns his head slowly toward the couch. Then back to me. “Who is that?” The question isn’t casual. There’s something under it now. Something sharp.
“I don’t know,” I say, breath still uneven. “Probably just?—”
My phone just sits there, like some sort of troublesome beacon. As if on cue, it lights up again. A name flashes across the screen. I don’t even fully register it before he’s already moving.
He crosses the room in a few steps, picking up my phone, his jaw tightening as he looks at the screen. “Who is this?” he asks.
I swallow, the name making my gut twinge. “It’s just—someone I used to?—”
The sentence doesn’t finish. Because something in his expression shifts. Dark. Dangerous.
The phone buzzes again in his hand. He stares at it for a second. He crushes it without looking away from me. The sound is sharp. Glass cracking. The screen splintering under the pressure of his grip.
I freeze, my breath catching in my throat.