Page 53 of Fractured Loyalties
We lie there in the dark, both of us on our sides, facing the same way. Not touching. But close enough that the heat of him curls along my back like breath.
His body behind mine in the bed, not touching, but close enough that I can feel the warmth of him ghosting against my spine.
And when I fall asleep, I don’t feel hunted. Or haunted.
Just wanted.
A sound wakes me, but it isn’t loud. Maybe it’s just the wind shifting against the house, the sigh of the ocean rearranging itself. I blink slowly, my cheek pressed to a pillow that smells like cedar and something darker beneath it—him.
Elias hasn’t moved. He’s still there behind me, that steady furnace of a body. Not touching. Still.
I turn slightly. Not to face him, not yet. Just enough to feel the pull of gravity where he lies. It’s new, the not-flinching. The not waiting for the catch beneath the calm.
I reach back, slow. My hand finds his forearm, warm under the fabric of his shirt. I don’t pull or grip. I just let it rest there.
He doesn’t speak. Doesn’t move.
But his breath catches. Once.
Then his hand covers mine.
We stay like that. Two people made of coiled silence, of bruised shadows learning a new kind of stillness.
Sleep pulls at me again, thick and forgiving.
Before I go under, I hear his voice. Barely there.
“Whatever this becomes, it’s yours to call it.”
And that’s the last thing I remember before the dark takes me whole.
Chapter 12 – Elias - The False Quiet
I wake before the sun, like always. Her breath is soft and steady in front of me, the rhythm faint but certain. I’m behind her, both of us curled toward the same direction, my body not quite touching hers, but close. So close I can feel her warmth even through the space between us.
She reached for me at some point, in the early hours.
Not with desperation. Not with need.
Just with calm.
Her hand, light on my forearm. Her skin against mine. No demands. No fear.
I almost pulled away. Three separate times, I told myself to leave the room, the bed, her heat, the entire fucking coastline if I had to.
I almost told myself it was too much, too soon—that the quiet between us could snap if I stayed.
But I didn’t.
I stayed because just before she fell asleep, she said nothing. And I heard everything.
Because when she rested her hand there and I covered it, it felt like neither of us was asking for more.
Just less fear.
And that felt like more than I deserve.
Now, the edge of morning tries to press through the curtains. The ocean grumbles below us, a slow and shifting tide.
