Chapter 6 – Silas - The Cage Knows Your Name #2
Her voice softens, barely. “You came to stand on my doorstep at six in the morning and you don’t know why?”
“No,” I say again, honest now. “But I can’t stop thinking about what would happen if I didn’t.”
That gets her.
A pause. A shift. Her eyes narrow, but not in warning.
In... consideration.
Then she opens the door another few inches. Enough to let the moment breathe, not enough to let me in.
“I don’t let people in,” she says.
“I’m not asking to come in.”
We’re standing there, inches apart, and it feels like a negotiation without terms.
She studies me. Long enough that the hush goes from awkward to electric.
Then she steps back once, barely clearing the doorway.
“I didn’t say I’d talk,” she says.
“You didn’t say you’d stop me, either.”
Her mouth twitches like she hates that I noticed.
I step forward, slow and measured.
And cross the threshold.
Her apartment is warm, not in temperature, but in the kind of lived-in hum that clings to walls. Sparse furniture. Everything purposeful. Nothing soft for softness’ sake. No throw pillows. No framed photos. No trace of someone else's touch.
Just her.
The floors are hardwood, dark and clean. A thin black coat is draped across the back of a chair by the window. One of her stilettos is tipped on its side beneath the small glass coffee table. There’s a half-empty bottle of bourbon on the kitchen counter, beside a single used glass.
I don’t speak.
Neither does she.
The door clicks shut behind me, and in that instant, the space between us shifts—not with tension, but with a friction that feels like flint meeting steel.
Lydia walks ahead of me. She’s barefoot, her hair slightly mussed, the silk of her robe catching the light from the far lamp. She is a vision, even when she doesn't turn around to see if I’m following.
She knows I am.
She stops at the edge of the living room and turns to face me, arms crossed. The robe dips as her weight shifts to one side.
“I didn’t invite you,” she says, but her voice is steady.
“You didn’t stop me, either.”
“I wanted to see what you’d do.”
“And?”
“I haven’t decided what it means yet.”
She’s testing me. Not for weakness. For intent.
I stay where I am. Just far enough not to crowd her. Just close enough to be undeniable.
My gaze slips past her to the untouched drink, the still-sleeping lamp, the curtain drawn only halfway across the tall window. She hasn’t slept. She didn’t even try. Whatever weight she walked out of Dom’s club with last night never left her shoulders.
“You watched me,” she says suddenly, almost like a dare.
I meet her eyes. “Yes.”
“How long?”
“Long enough to see you stop pretending you were okay.”
She doesn’t look away. But her expression hardens.
“You think watching gives you permission to show up?”
“No,” I say. “I think it makes me incapable of staying away.”
She laughs. But it’s a bitter, low sound. The kind you make when something unwanted gets too close to being true.
“Are you here to protect me?” she asks, almost mockingly.
“No,” I answer, without hesitation.
Her brow lifts.
“I don’t think you need protecting,” I add. “I think you’re just waiting for someone who doesn’t look at your scars like they want to own them.”
That knocks the air out of the room.
Her expression doesn’t falter, but her arms uncross. She steps toward me once, with purpose.
“You think you’re that person?”
I don’t answer. Because I’m not sure if I am.
But I want to be.
She watches my face for something—doubt, guilt, weakness—and doesn’t find it.
Then, quietly: “You shouldn’t be here.”
“I know.”
“Drazen will notice.”
“I know.”
The pause that follows doesn’t settle. It pulses between us—measured, hot, unwelcome.
She walks past me.
Not toward the door.
Toward the kitchen.
She picks up a glass and pours herself a drink.
“Dom said you were watching me,” she says. “He seemed amused.”
“He’s always amused. Doesn’t mean he’s wrong.”
She sips. Sets the glass down. Then adds, “He said you looked like you wanted something.”
“And you said?”
“That you weren’t my type.”
I wait. She turns.
Her eyes meet mine, calm as a loaded gun.
“You still aren’t,” she says.
I step toward her. “That’s a lie.”
“Maybe. You’re dangerous,” she says.
“You appear like someone who fancies danger.”
“I hate predictable.”
That hits like a kiss spoken in code.
She finishes the bourbon. Sets the glass down. Doesn’t step away from me.
“You’re still not my type,” she adds.
I close the gap between us.
Her chin tips up—defiant, but not retreating.
"I'm not trying to be your type," I murmur. "I'm here because I can't stay away from you, no matter how many times I try."
That unlocks something in her.
Her pupils widen. Her pulse flickers at her neck.
She doesn’t move away.
She doesn’t move at all.
Not yet.
The moment folds in on itself.
Not a kiss. Not contact. Just the static that hums between two people who have already crossed the line without touching.
She’s still. I’m stiller.
Everything loud in my head goes quiet when she looks at me like that. Like she’s already opened the door inside herself but hasn’t decided if I’m meant to enter or be buried behind it.
My hand rises to her chin. I don’t touch. Just… hover. Inches away. The space where want lives before it’s acted on. Her mouth parts slightly, but she doesn’t lean in.
“Do you want me to leave?” I ask.
“No.”
Her voice is too soft for games.
“Do you want me to stay?”
Stillness.
Then she steps forward and places her mouth on mine.
It's not soft.
It's not sweet.
It's raw.
The first taste of her is bourbon and something darker—desperation, maybe, or the kind of recklessness that comes from wanting something you know will ruin you. Her lips part against mine and I'm drowning in it, in her, in the heat that radiates off her skin like fever.
Her hands slide into my shirt, over my skin, nails grazing where they shouldn't. Every touch is deliberate. Claiming. My belt is undone before I realize she's even touched it, her fingers working with the kind of urgency that makes my breath catch.
My hand finds her hip, fingers sliding under the silk, and her skin burns under my palm like she's branded with everything we can't say. She makes a sound—low, needy—and it unravels something in my chest.
Her robe slips off one shoulder, exposing the curve of her collarbone. I trace it with my mouth, tasting salt and something floral—jasmine, maybe—mixed with the scent of her skin. She tilts her head back, throat exposed, inviting more, and God help me, I want to give her everything.
My other hand fists in her hair and I kiss her back like a man who's dying of thirst and just found water that might kill him.
She arches into me, her body flush against mine, and I can feel her heartbeat hammering against my ribs—or maybe that's mine.
I can't tell anymore where I end and she begins.
We're tangled now. Breathing into each other. Her back pressed to the counter, the robe sliding open more, my shirt half off. Her hands map the planes of my chest like she's memorizing me, like she's afraid this moment will vanish if she doesn't hold tight enough.
I kiss the corner of her mouth. Her jaw. That spot just below her ear that makes her gasp. She tastes like want and whiskey and something I don't have a name for—something that feels like falling and flying at the same time.
Her fingers dig into my shoulders, pulling me closer, and we're seconds away—
And then she freezes.
Not recoils.
Not startles.
Just… stills.
Like a thread snapped somewhere inside her.
I stop moving.
Her hands are still on me. But they're not pulling anymore.
Her mouth hovers near mine, our foreheads almost touching.
I can feel her pulse through her fingertips—rabbit-fast, erratic.
Then she whispers, so low I almost miss it—
"We need to stop. If we do this… it won't mean nothing."
I don’t speak.
Because she’s right.
Her hands fall away from my skin, trembling just enough to be human.
She steps back.
Not far. Just enough to put air between us. Just enough to let the moment collapse without shattering.
She looks at me, flushed, chest rising, pupils wide. Devastated and starving.
“I’m not ready,” she says.
My throat works, but words won’t form right away. I reach up and fix the strap of her robe, sliding it back over her shoulder like it’s sacred now.
“I would’ve stayed,” I say.
“I know.”
Neither of us moves for a long time.
Then she crosses her arms over her chest and turns away—back toward the kitchen.
This time, it feels like retreat.
I do the only thing I know to do: I gather the lull, fold it around me like a coat, and walk to the door.
She doesn’t try to stop me.
She doesn’t need to.
The moment already branded itself into both of us.