Another morning in the villa, but there was no peace. The air was heavy with spectre of danger.
I walked aimlessly through the sunlit living room, the chill atmosphere seeping into my skin. Beyond the windows, the sea glittered, waves thudding onto the beach, oblivious to all that was coming apart in these walls. The world continued to turn. The tide kept falling and rising.
But I couldn't breathe.
The bandage on my foot was tight, the stitches beneath it tugging with every step. It didn’t hurt, not really, but the reminder of how close I’d come to something far worse was impossible to ignore. Every shift of fabric against my skin made the memory sharper: the glint of a knife. The scrape of boots against stone. The sound of Caspian breaking a man apart with his bare hands.
I pushed the images away and closed my eyes.
I sensed Caspian looming behind me before I actually did hear him.
He dominated the room, filling it with himself like a forming stormy sky. Quiet, but present — the way he leaned against doorframes, the way he held me in consideration with eyes such as a shadow. Trailing each step of mine as though he would otherwise lose me were he to even blink.
It had been three days. Three days since the break-in. Three days since Victor Dane had narrowly evaded a whole crew of security guards and left his signature on our lives like a scorch. And in those three days, Caspian hadn't left my side.
Not once.
And now he lay back against the window, fingers laced across the back of his neck, jaw-line chopping as angular as jagged glass. He stared out to sea, but tension vibrated through him as though he'd been expecting some onslaught which still had not come.
He hadn’t slept.. I could tell.
The dark shadows below his eyes were strangely visible, his normally neat appearance fraying at the seams. His shirt was wrinkled, top two buttons undone, sleeves rolled to the elbows — revealing the stitched gash on his forearm. His bruise-colored jaw was yellowed, but the rage in his eyes was not.
It burned, hot and relentless, eating away at him from the inside out.
I did not like it.
I hated watching him collapse that way, hated the pacing in the house like a caged beast, hated the way he just brushed past me when I flinched — as if he thought he could break me with his fingers.
I hated not having the an idea on how to draw him back from the edge.
I had the cupboard and took a glass, my handsome trembling. I filled the glass with water from the sink,, forcing myself to breathe deeply.
But when I set the glass onto the counter, it clunked against the marble.
Hard. Sharp.
And Caspian flinched.
It was not a movement at all — a lift of his shoulders, a shiver of tension along his back — but I saw it. I Saw the way his fist was curled up against his back, saw the way he cocked his head to one side, waiting.
For something to happen.
My chest expanded.
"Caspian," I whispered, my voice barely more than a breath.
He did not answer.
I spun, my heart pounding, and he was completely immobile. He wasn't breathing normally, his chest jerking and falling in small gasps, muscles clenched so hard I was scared he would snap.
I glided across the floor, nude feet on marble, stopping just behind him. Close enough to touch, yet not close enough to touch.
I didn't have a clue what to say.
Or maybe I did, and was too afraid to say it.
So I did what I had intended.
I crept up close behind him, hooking my arms around his waist, leaning down to the space between his shoulder blades. His whole body tautened against mine, stiff as stone in my arms, but I refused to release him.
I hugged him as if I was trying to hold him to me.
And then — after a hesitation — after an open, suspended silence — he fell.
He fell so fast that I was reeling, but he had me, his hands against my face like he was afraid to let go for fear of losing me. His lips crashed into mine, the kiss so desperate and starving, it was bruising and relentless.
His fingers pressed hard into the flesh of my cheeks, and I didn't mind.
I kissed him back with equal force, pouring all the fear and love and relief into the crunch of our lips, the crunch of our bodies together as if we could somehow mend ourselves through it.
When he finally pulled away, he was sweating and panting, his forehead against mine.
"I can't lose you," he growled, voice ripped and frayed. "You don't get it, Lily. I can't. I can't—"
"I'm right here," I panted, my hands cupping his face. His stubble tickled my skin, holding me in place. "I'm right here, Caspian."
His breath was a beast's, savage and wild, but I caught it — the crack of his mask. The gap of his pain that he couldn't cover.
"I dream about it all the time," he admitted, his voice trembling. "I dream of him with the knife. Dream of him leaning over you. And if I wasn't fast enough. I nearly—"
His voice broke and I kissed him again to quiet the words.
We fell to the floor, arms and legs around each other, his back against the wall and me bent into a half-bow across his lap. He leaned forward, as if he were trying to join us, fingers tangling in my hair, and I did not move him away.
I let him fall.
For in that instant, I saw, then, that he wasn't shielding me.
He was trying to compensate.
For not being fast enough. For letting Victor get so close. For not stopping it.
He had been holding it inside as if it were his fault.
And I didn't know how to make him see he didn't have to.
"I love you," I breathed, the words out before I could catch them.
His breath stopped.
His fingers curled, and he pulled back far enough to look at me, his eyes blazing.
He never said the words.
But I felt it in the manner that he kissed me, slow and deliberate that time.
I felt it in the way that he placed me onto the bed and held me lightly, cradling me fragile as a dove, his lips tracing along my form like a promise.
I heard it in the silence as we were pushed together, his pulse against my ear like it was strapped to mine.
He didn't need to say It.
I already knew.
Knowing didn't make it any less true, though.
Victor was still out there.