Chapter 159 Not Done, Just Quiet

Chapter 159 Not Done, Just Quiet
Anya's POV

The message that comes through while Levi's still on the phone with Marcus is shorter than any of the others.

Not done. Just quiet for now.

Then nothing. No follow-up, no explanation, the account going dark again within minutes according to Marcus's tracking software, like whoever's behind it wanted us to know he could still reach me and nothing more. It should terrify me more than it does. Maybe I've simply run out of room for new fear after two months of carrying it, maybe there's a ceiling on how much a person can hold before the body just stops responding the way it's supposed to.

Levi hovers near the porch railing for a long time after the call ends, phone gripped tight in his hand like he's waiting for it to ring again, before finally sitting down beside me, the fight visibly draining out of him in slow, exhausted stages.

Levi sits beside me on the guesthouse porch afterward, phone finally silent, both of us staring out at the dark lawn like it might offer some answer neither of us has found yet.

"He's not going to stop just because we know his name," Levi says quietly. "Or the name he's using, anyway."

"I know."

"I keep waiting for the version of this where it's actually over. Where someone gets arrested and the case closes and we get to just, exist. Normally. Without checking messages like they're bombs." He drags a hand down his face, the exhaustion of the last two months settling into every line of him. "I used to think that version was close. Every time we got a piece of the puzzle, I thought, okay, this is it, this is the last one. And then there's always another layer underneath."

"Maybe that version doesn't exist yet," I say. "Maybe it's still coming, just slower than we want it to."

He's quiet for a moment, and I watch the tension slowly drain out of his shoulders, replaced by something heavier, more exhausted. Two months of this have worn grooves into both of us, sleepless nights, jumpy nerves, a permanent low hum of vigilance neither of us knew how to switch off even during the good moments.

"Can I say something that's going to sound strange, given everything?" he asks.

"Always."

"I'm grateful for it. Not the danger, God, not that. But everything it forced us to become to each other." He turns to look at me, moonlight catching the exhaustion and the tenderness both at once on his face. "Before the gala, before any of this, I don't think either of us knew how to be fully honest with each other.

I was still performing a version of myself for cameras and business dinners. You were still shrinking yourself down to fit into spaces that were never built for you. This, all of it, terrifying as it's been, it stripped both of us down to something realer."

"That's a very poetic way to describe a stalker," I say, but there's no bite in it, just quiet affection.

"I contain multitudes," he says, echoing himself from weeks ago, and it startles a laugh out of me that feels like the first easy one in days.

"I used to think love was supposed to feel calm," I say slowly, turning the thought over as I speak it. "Steady. Uncomplicated. And then I fell in love with you in the middle of the most chaotic few months of my life, and it turns out love doesn't wait for convenient timing. It just shows up in whatever mess you're standing in and asks you to choose it anyway."

"And did you? Choose it?"

"Every single day since the gala," I say. "Even the days I was too scared to say it out loud."

He reaches over, threading his fingers through mine, and for a while we just sit there, listening to the crickets, the distant hum of the estate's security system, the ordinary sounds of a night that isn't actively falling apart around us.

"I keep thinking about who I was before all this," Levi says eventually. "The guy who thought discipline meant never letting anything touch me. Compartmentalizing everything so cleanly nothing ever bled through the cracks." He shakes his head slightly. "You taught me that's not strength. That's just a different kind of hiding, dressed up to look like control."

"You taught me the opposite," I admit. "I used to think surviving meant staying small, staying quiet, never taking up more space than felt safe. You made me loud. Publicly, unapologetically loud, in a way that terrified me before it started feeling like freedom."

"We balanced each other out," he says softly. "Still do."

"Still do," I agree, and lean my head against his shoulder, feeling something in my chest settle for the first time in what feels like forever, not resolved, not safe exactly, but steadier. Held.

"Do you think we'll look back on this someday," I ask, "and it'll feel like a story instead of something we're still living through?"

"I hope so." He presses a kiss to the top of my head. "I hope someday this is just the terrifying chapter before the good part, instead of the whole book."

"That's very optimistic for a guy who just got a threatening text twenty minutes ago."

"I've decided to be annoyingly hopeful about us specifically. Everything else, I reserve the right to panic about."

I laugh again, softer this time, and for a few minutes it's just this, his arm around me, the quiet estate grounds stretching out dark and peaceful in front of us, both of us finally exhaling after months of holding our breath in different ways. It doesn't erase any of it. The fear is still there, coiled and patient, waiting for its next opening. But for tonight, on this porch, it doesn't get to be the only thing that's true.

"I love you," I say, quiet enough that it's just for him. "Whatever comes next."

"I love you too," he says. "Whatever it is, we face it together. No more hiding pieces of ourselves from each other, no matter how scared we get."

We sit there a while longer, and just as I finally start to feel my shoulders unknot completely, the crickets loud and steady, the estate's security lights glowing soft gold along the far tree line, Levi's phone buzzes once against the porch step between us, not the burner number this time, but a name neither of us expected to see again.

Sloane Whitfield: I know who he really is. I need to talk to you both tonight. It's about my father.