Chapter 18 - Late-Night Whispers
Sam's POV
I couldn’t sleep.
The dorm was too quiet, which made every sound stand out louder than it should have—the drip of the bathroom faucet down the hall, the occasional creak of the old building settling, the faint hum of the heater that never really worked. But it wasn’t the noises keeping me awake. It was Elias.
He lay on the bed opposite mine, back against the wall, his lamp turned low but not off. Shadows cut across his face in sharp angles, softening and hardening at once, like he couldn’t decide if he wanted to look dangerous or boyish. A book rested in his hands, though I had the sense he wasn’t actually reading it anymore.
And I was hyper-aware of him. Every breath he took. The way his fingers absentmindedly drummed against the cover. The way his eyes flicked up from the page to me, and then away, like he thought I didn’t notice.
But I noticed. God, I noticed everything.
“You know,” he said finally, voice low so it wouldn’t carry down the hall, “you’re terrible at pretending to sleep.”
Heat crawled up my neck. I turned toward the wall, my face half buried in the pillow. “I wasn’t pretending. I was just… closing my eyes.”
He chuckled, and the sound was deep, amused. “You were staring at the ceiling for thirty minutes straight. That doesn’t count.”
I peeked at him over my shoulder. His book was now flat on his lap, forgotten. His gaze, though, was sharp—too sharp, like he could peel back my layers if he looked long enough. That stare of his always unsettled me, not because it was cruel, but because it was curious. Dangerous in a different way.
“Can’t sleep either?” I asked, trying to sound casual, even though my throat felt tight.
“Didn’t try.” He shrugged. “I don’t usually sleep much. Too many thoughts.”
“Like what?”
He tilted his head, studying me in that unhurried way of his, as if deciding whether I was worth the truth. “Like how someone doesn’t quite add up.”
My heart stuttered. He couldn’t mean me. Not yet. I forced a laugh. “You mean one of the guys? Because trust me, none of them add up.”
“Maybe.” His lips curved, but it wasn’t quite a smile. “Maybe not.”
The silence that followed was thick. Heavy. Charged in a way that made me restless under the blanket. I wanted to pull it over my head and hide, but I also wanted to sit up and challenge him, to see how far I could go before his calm cracked.
Instead, I whispered, “Why do you even talk to me?”
His brow arched, faint amusement flickering across his face. “Why wouldn’t I?”
“Because…” My throat closed up. Because I wasn’t supposed to be here. Because if he looked too closely, if he ever figured out I wasn’t the boy I pretended to be, everything would collapse. “Because I’m no one,” I muttered instead.
His eyes darkened. He leaned forward slightly, resting his forearms on his knees. “You don’t talk like no one. You don’t look at people like no one. You’ve got secrets written all over you, Hale.”
Hale. He always said it like he knew it was both my name and not my name. Like he could taste the lie under it.
I swallowed hard. “And what about you? You act like you’re not part of them. But you live here. You share a room with me. You’re not exactly clean either.”
That pulled a real smile out of him. Small, crooked, but sharp. “Touché.”
We stared at each other across the room, my heartbeat thundering in my ears. He should have looked away. I should have closed my eyes and ended this stupid conversation before it went too far. But neither of us did. Instead, the air between us stretched thinner and thinner, pulled tight like a thread ready to snap.
“Come here,” he said suddenly.
My breath hitched. “What?”
“Not like that,” he said quickly, though there was a flicker in his eyes that made me question his choice of words. He nodded toward the window between our beds. “Just… sit with me for a minute. You look like you’re carrying the weight of the world.”
Which wasn’t far from the truth.
I hesitated, blanket clutched tight around me. This was dangerous. Getting close to Elias, letting him see more than the surface, was exactly what I shouldn’t do. But my legs moved anyway. I slid out of bed, the floorboards cold under my feet, and crossed the narrow space until I stood beside him.
He shifted over just enough to make room on the edge of his mattress. Our shoulders brushed when I sat down, and even through the fabric of my hoodie, the contact made my pulse leap.
“See?” he said softly. “Not so bad.”
I glanced at him. The lamplight caught on his jaw, his cheekbones, the strands of dark hair that had fallen across his forehead. He was too close. I could see the line of his throat when he swallowed, the slow rise and fall of his chest.
And I hated that part of me noticed.
“You should sleep,” I whispered.
“So should you.” His voice dropped lower, almost intimate. “But you can’t. Because something keeps you up at night.”
My mouth went dry. He wasn’t wrong. My sister’s face haunted me every time I closed my eyes, her laughter turning into a scream, her absence filling every corner of my mind.
Elias’s gaze softened, like he could see the storm behind my silence. “Whatever it is… you don’t have to carry it alone.”
If only he knew.
“I’m fine,” I said too quickly.
“You’re a terrible liar.”
I froze, breath catching in my throat. Did he know? Did he mean more than my secret grief? More than the mask of being Sam Hale, boy?
I shifted slightly away, but his hand shot out and caught my wrist. Not hard. Just enough to stop me. His touch was warm, steady, grounding in a way that made me want to crumble.
“Relax,” he murmured, almost like he was coaxing a frightened animal. “I’m not your enemy.”
I wanted to believe that. God, I wanted to. But I couldn’t let myself. Not when I was here for revenge. Not when trusting him could unravel everything.
“You don’t know me,” I whispered.
“Maybe not.” His thumb brushed against the inside of my wrist, sending sparks through me I had no business feeling. “But I’d like to.”
The words hung in the air, heavier than they should have been. My heart pounded so loudly I was sure he could hear it.
I pulled back, slipping out of his hold before I lost myself completely. “Goodnight, Elias.”
His eyes lingered on me, unreadable, but he leaned back against the wall and let me go. “Goodnight, Hale.”
I climbed back into bed, pulling the blanket over my head this time, not to hide from him but from myself. My skin still burned where he’d touched me, my pulse refusing to settle.
I had come here for revenge. Not for late-night whispers. Not for the way Elias made the walls of my disguise feel paper-thin.
And yet, as I shut my eyes, I swore I could still feel his gaze on me.
Then, just as I was drifting on the edge of uneasy sleep, I heard him whisper into the quiet, his voice barely audible but enough to freeze me in place.
“I know you’re not who you say you are.”