Chapter 62 - Threadbare
Chapter 62 - Threadbare
Topher
He hadn’t meant to end up here — crouched half-out of sight, tucked behind the half-drawn curtain near the end of the hallway, his back pressed to the cold molding where stone met frame. The penthouse floor had too many corners and too few places to breathe, and somehow this one — dim, narrow, forgotten — had swallowed him whole.
He could hear them.
Not the words, not really — just the shape of them. The rise and fall of voices he could name by cadence alone: Jaquelyn. Ezekial. Coren. And that other one — the one who wasn’t supposed to be anything, but was suddenly everything.
The shifter.
No. Evren.
Topher clutched his knees, fingers laced tight — not trembling, but close. He wasn’t afraid of Evren, not exactly, but something about the man carved space when he entered. The room seemed to rearrange itself to make room — not because of presence, but because of pressure.
And Jaquelyn... Saints, Jaquelyn.
She didn’t just hold the room. She changed it. Not with noise. Not with spectacle. Just inevitability. It unnerved him, how easily the axis shifted — how she became the center of something without asking to be.
He wanted to be part of that. He wanted — gods, he didn’t even know what he wanted. To matter? To belong? To have someone look at him and see something more than weakness, more than a mistake?
But she didn’t look at him like that. She hadn’t looked at him at all.
Not since she touched the shifter.
That moment had fractured something in him. Not a clean break — a drift. As if the line that had once tethered him — to Ezekial, to the bond, to her — had begun to unravel, one fine thread at a time.
He didn’t know how he could feel it, but he did. Like a tether pulled tight between them — not between her and Ezekial, as it should have been, but between her and Evren. It knotted in his gut. Not jealousy — not quite — but something heavier.
Displacement. Like watching someone else walk into a room and take your place at the table, only to realize everyone had known they were meant to sit there all along.
He didn’t fit.
He was supposed to be Ezekial’s childer. Supposed to be important. Chosen. Marked. A thread in something vast and woven. But now he felt like an offcut — snipped, curled, and overlooked.
Jaquelyn had stepped into that role without trying, and the whole damn house had rearranged itself around her. Even now, from behind the curtain, he could feel the web of energy stretch and tremble — and none of it pointed to him.
There had been a time, brief but blinding, when he thought maybe he was special. The hunger that had once hollowed him out had felt like a call, not a curse. The way Ezekial had looked at him — like a puzzle worth solving — it had almost been enough.
Almost.
But not anymore.
Now Ezekial watched Jaquelyn. Not with hunger. Not even with duty. With gravity. With something like care.
Topher bit the inside of his cheek — hard. It didn’t help.
He hadn’t fed since that last sanctioned pull. Hadn’t asked. Didn’t know if he was allowed. And worse — he didn’t want to ask. Because if the answer was no, he might break. Because if the answer was yes, it would mean he still mattered — but only as an obligation.
He closed his eyes and pressed his forehead to the frame. The stone was cold. It steadied him. A little.
There were voices. Movement. Something shifting just out of reach. He didn’t go to it. Didn’t interrupt. Didn’t belong.
He had tried so hard not to be the broken one. Not to be the boy with too much want and not enough worth. He had tried to be clever. Useful. Wanted. But in the silence behind the curtain, all the trying in the world couldn’t drown out the truth.
He wasn’t wanted.
Not by her. Not really.
Not anymore.
So he stayed still — a forgotten thread, knotted up at the edge of the weave — and prayed no one pulled too hard.
He didn’t hear her at first. The shuffle of feet was nearly silent — more a hesitation than a step, the kind of pause made by someone searching for quiet, not company.
Lacey rounded the corner slowly, moving with that early stiffness that came before anything showed — more fatigue than form, just enough to make her body crave softness and her feet ache for stillness. She looked like she’d been seeking solitude, not him — but when she caught the flicker of motion behind the curtain, she froze.
“Topher?” Her voice was light, unsure. Not intrusive. Just surprised.
He stiffened.
She took a tentative step closer. “Didn’t mean to sneak up on you. I just... needed to sit for a second.”
He didn’t answer. Not with words.
He curled in tighter and looked away, hoping she'd take the hint and vanish. But she didn’t. She lingered — and then, slowly, carefully, eased herself down to the floor across from him with a soft, relieved sigh.
“Gods, my back is killing me,” she murmured, more to herself than to him. “They say it gets better. They lie.”
Topher glanced at her. Not hostile — just wary.
She met his eyes briefly, then dropped her gaze. “Didn’t expect anyone else to be hiding back here.”
“I’m not hiding,” he muttered.
“Sure.” Her smile was small, wry, but not unkind. “Me neither.”
They sat in silence, the quiet thick between them.
Then her eyes flicked back to him, slower this time, and stayed. Her brow furrowed.
“You look... thin.”
He let out a breath that hovered between amusement and defeat. “Thanks.”
“No, I mean — pale. Drawn.” Concern sharpened her voice. “When’s the last time you fed?”
He didn’t respond.
That was answer enough.
Her smile faded, replaced by something steadier, more serious. “Topher.”
He looked down at his hands.
“I didn’t — I wasn’t sure I was still allowed,” he said at last.
Her expression softened, something quiet and fierce rising just beneath her restraint. “That’s not how this works.”
She didn’t reach for him. Didn’t scold. Just saw him.
And somehow, that was worse.