Chapter 18 Colette
Colette
“Wait,” I gasped, my voice catching somewhere between a plea and a breath.
Silas went still beneath me, every line of him tense, solid, barely contained. His hands didn’t move, but I could feel the restraint in them — the careful way his fingers eased their grip at my hips, like he was afraid of breaking something fragile.
I wanted him. God, I wanted him.
But the wanting was tangled — too close to the ache I’d been trying to outrun since everything collapsed. Every time I thought I’d burned the past away, it found its way back into my throat.
“I just—” I started, then stopped, the words caught between my ribs. “I need a second.”
His brow furrowed, but he didn’t speak. Didn’t push. Just waited, breathing hard, eyes searching mine with a patience I didn’t deserve.
It undid me more than anything else could have.
Because Josh never waited.
Josh had made me feel like slowing down was an inconvenience, like the only way to be wanted was to keep up.
But Silas… he just was. Steady. Present. Warm.
“I’m not stopping,” I whispered, my lips brushing his jaw. “I just… want to make sure I’m… thinking clearly. I don’t want to be someone else’s mistake. Not again.”
His breath shuddered out slowly, the sound more intimate than anything that came before it. “Colette,” he said, my name roughened in his throat, “you couldn’t be a mistake if you tried.”
Something inside me loosened at that. The ache, the fear — all of it. And when I finally leaned in, forehead to his, the wanting was still there, sharper than ever.
But it felt different now.
Like the start of something real.
I wasn’t sure what scared me more.
I thought maybe if I leaned in, if I just let it happen, the noise in my head would quiet. That wanting him would feel clean instead of complicated.
So I kissed him — softly, carefully — and for a second, it worked. The world narrowed to the warmth of his mouth and the steady weight of his hands at my waist.
But the second stretched too long. My breath stuttered. Something in my chest cracked wide open, and the rush of it wasn’t desire anymore. It was fear.
Grief. Everything I hadn’t wanted him to see.
“I can’t,” I whispered, pulling back. “I thought I could, but I can’t.”
Silas didn’t speak. Didn’t move. His eyes searched mine, full of something heavy — not disappointment, not frustration. Just understanding. The kind that hurt worse because it was gentle.
He reached up, brushed a thumb along my jaw, the touch steady and unbearably kind. “Colette,” he said quietly. “You don’t have to explain.”
I tried to laugh, but it broke somewhere halfway out. “I always think I’m fine until I’m not.”
His hand fell away, but not far — resting on my shoulder, warm through the fabric of his shirt. “You don’t have to prove you’re fine, either.”
The silence that followed wasn’t awkward. Just… full.
Full of things we weren’t ready to say, of the space between want and restraint. I stayed in his lap for a heartbeat longer, just breathing — my forehead against his, the both of us trying to remember how to be still.
Then I let out a tiny, helpless laugh. “That got… intense.”
Silas huffed out a sound somewhere between a chuckle and a groan, resting his head against my shoulder. “You think?”
It broke something between us — in the best way.
For a long moment, I could only feel the rhythm of his breathing against mine — the ragged, unsteady kind that felt stolen from the stars outside. My legs were trembling, my heart thudding somewhere in my throat.
Then he shifted beneath me. I thought he might speak, but he stood, still holding me, his hands steady under my thighs.
“Silas—” I started, a startled laugh catching in my chest.
“Shhh.” He adjusted his grip, carrying me the few steps toward the old armchair by the fire. “You’ll melt if I put you down anywhere else.”
I snorted, but it came out soft. He sat first, pulling me down with him so that I was perched sideways across his lap, half-swaddled in his arms. The chair creaked in protest, but he just murmured, “There. Better.”
The fire had burned low — amber and slow. The air between us still felt charged, but now it hummed instead of crackled. My fingers toyed with the edge of his collar, tracing the damp heat of his neck.
“I can’t believe you just carried me,” I said, the laugh slipping out before I could stop it.
“You looked like you might fall apart,” he muttered, which only made it funnier.
“So bossy.”
“Ungrateful,” he countered, the corner of his mouth twitching.
I rested my head against his shoulder, trying not to smile too hard. “You’re kind of—”
“Don’t,” he warned, but I could hear the grin behind it.
“—sweet,” I finished, grinning outright now.
He groaned quietly, tipping his head back. “You ruin everything, menace.”
“Yeah,” I whispered, tugging lightly at his shirt, “but you let me.”
For a while, neither of us said anything. The chair creaked again, his thumb drew lazy circles against my arm, and the heat between us settled into something almost gentle.
And that was the strangest part — that after all of it, the chaos and the closeness, nothing about this… about him felt dangerous anymore. It just felt… safe.
I don’t know how long we stayed like that. Long enough for the fire to sink into embers, for the air to cool around us until his body felt like the only steady warmth left in the room.
It should’ve been awkward, sitting tangled in his lap like some lovesick cliché. But it wasn’t. Every time I thought about moving, his hand flexed at my waist like he wasn’t ready to let me go, and I… didn’t want to make him.
That realization came quietly and slowly, like snow melting through cracks. Because this — the safety, the soft after-breath of something wild — was exactly the thing I’d convinced myself didn’t exist.
And I wanted to keep it.
When I finally stirred, it wasn’t to escape. I just whispered, “The mattress’ll be warmer,” and he hummed like he agreed, though neither of us moved right away.
Then he did — in that same careful, steady way he always did everything that mattered. He stood again, lifting me like I weighed nothing, and set me down on the pile of blankets by the fire.
The sheets still smelled of heat and cedar and him. I watched as he roused the flames once more, shadows softening his jaw, his shoulders.
When he slid in beside me, there was no hesitation this time. He just folded me in, chest to my back, with an arm slung over my waist. His breath found that quiet rhythm again, slow and even against my neck.
Then he murmured, half-asleep already, “You okay?”
I nodded before I could think. “Yeah. Just…” I turned enough to meet his eyes. “Don’t disappear on me when I wake up, okay?”
He smiled — tired, crooked, too tender for what we were supposed to be. “Wouldn’t dare.”
For a long while, neither of us spoke. The room felt small and endless all at once. The tension unraveled, soft and clumsy.
He pulled the blanket over us with exaggerated care, tucking it under my chin. “There. Safe and sound.”
“Like a burrito,” I murmured, already smiling.
“A very alluring burrito,” he said, and I could hear the grin in his voice.
We dissolved into laughter — quiet ones, breathless and contagious. The kind that makes your ribs ache but feels like a promise all on its own.
I rolled onto my back, staring up at the ceiling while the firelight flickered across it. “You’re supposed to be brooding,” I teased softly. “Not making me giggle like a kid.”
He propped himself up on one elbow, looking down at me with a glint I hadn’t seen before — warm, unguarded. “Yeah, well,” he said, brushing a piece of hair off my cheek, “maybe you bring out the wrong kind of trouble in me.”
I grinned, eyes fluttering shut as he settled beside me again, his arm draped lazily across my waist. The air still buzzed between us, but it wasn’t sharp anymore. It was… steady. Sweet.
And when he whispered, half-asleep, “Goodnight, trouble,” I couldn’t stop the laugh that bubbled up — soft against his chest.
“Goodnight, writer boy.”
And when he pulled me closer, I let myself believe it.