Page 47 of What You left in Me

I left before I started flipping tables.

The hallway is dark except for the runner lights Eleanor had a designer install. I think they’re a little ridiculous, but whatever. They make the corridor look like a runway for ghosts and it’s fine. Not like I live here year-round.

I take it slowly, the old map of creaks and soft spots still in my calves. I’m not avoiding anyone. I’m not looking for anyone either. Not on purpose.

Yet I find her.

More accurately: I turn the corner and hit her.

Literally. Shoulder to shoulder, breath to breath, two people with no business being awake colliding in a house that pretends it’s asleep.

Ariane gasps and takes one step back, then another, until her spine finds the wainscoting. My hands are already up, one catching the rail, the other catching… her. Barely. The heat of her arm burns through the thin fabric. I don’t move it. Neither does she.

She’s in a nightgown that would be illegal in any country with common sense. Pale, almost translucent, cut simple, falling just above her knees like the designer forgot what modesty is. There’s a robe technically involved, but it’s hanging open, belt trailing like it changed its mind. The light along the floor throws a soft shine through the cotton and my brain—helpful bastard—fills in the rest. Curves I shouldn’t be charting. The long line of a thigh I shouldn’t touch. The suggestion of everything I already know I want.

Her hair’s down and messy in a way that looks like a crime scene. Her mouth is softer than it was when she said ‘We can’t’ in my car. Her eyes flick over me, T-shirt, jaw, mouth, and then back up like she didn’t just do that.

“Couldn’t sleep?” I ask. It comes out lower than I plan, rough, a drag down a stone wall.

She swallows. It’s the smallest movement, but it feels obscene. I want to fuck her. God, I want her. I want to spank that ass of hers and feel her wetness on my fingers. Make her scream my name until she’s crying, and choking, and begging for mercy.

“No.” She clears her throat. “I mean… yeah. Couldn’t.”

Her gaze skitters past me toward the arm of hallway that leads to the guest rooms. “You scared me.”

“I’ve heard that before. Though maybe it’s smart for you to be scared,” I say, and step back half an inch, a concession to the fact that if I stay where I am one of us is going to decide we can’t spin in the morning. I can smell her. It’s not the expensive bullshit Eleanor swears by. Spotless skin. Soap. The faintest hint of a zesty scent because this house is made of summers.

“Where’s Julian?” I ask, even though I don’t want the answer.

“In our… In the bedroom,” she says, struggling to get the words out. “I couldn’t sleep, so I was—” She raises the glass in her hand like evidence. Half the contents have been sloshed out of it. Still, she awkwardly adds, “Water.”

“That’s one way to get wet,” I scoff, tilting my head towards her. “How’s the campaign boyfriend, really? Still planning your recovery for you?”

She flinches. It’s there and gone, but I know what it looks like when something lands. “Fiancé,” she sighs. “Don’t start, Finn. Please.”

“Who says I ever stopped?” I counter.

I do need to stop. I’m exhausted and feral and there’s a part of me that wants to play nice because she’s been through enough. Unfortunately, there’s a louder part that doesn’t give a shit about nice.

“He looked really helpful at the hospital. Especially when the doctor said the quiet part out loud.”

Her fingers tighten around the glass until the tendon in her wrist shows. “Don’t do that, Finn.”

“What’s that?”

“Be cruel because you’re scared.”

I could deny it. I don’t bother. The walls have ears and she, apparently, has extremely perceptive eyes. “Fair,” I acknowledge, unwilling to lie to her.

We stand in the hush, and I can feel it building, that pressure-change thing that happens right before the storm hits town.

“You should go back to bed,” she says at last. Her voice is quiet in the hallway, private in a way that feels like a secret we’re already sharing. It isn’t an order; it’s a suggestion, and she sounds like she already knows I’m not the kind of man who follows suggestions.

“Are you sleepy?” I ask, even though the answer is written all over her face.

“No,” she says. She lifts the glass in her hand like that might prove something. “Not even close.”

“Me neither,” I say. The words land between us and settle. There’s nowhere for them to go.