Chapter 5 Charisma
CHARISMA
The pounding woke me from a dead sleep.
For a disorienting moment, I didn’t know where I was. Warm sheets. A heavy arm draped over my waist. The smell of cedar and leather and sex.
Then the memories flooded back—the storm, the mailbox, T.J., the kitchen table, his mouth, his hands, the way he’d said my name like it meant something—and heat rushed to my cheeks even as my heart started hammering.
The pounding came again. A fist against wood, urgent and relentless.
“Charisma.” T.J.’s voice was rough with sleep but alert. Already moving. “Stay here.”
He slid out of bed, and I caught a glimpse of his bare back, the muscles shifting as he grabbed a pair of sweatpants from the floor and pulled them on. Then he was gone, the bedroom door clicking shut behind him.
I sat up, pulling the quilt to my chest. Pale gray light filtered through the curtains—morning, but barely. The storm had quieted to a soft hush of falling snow. Through the thin walls, I heard the front door open, a rush of cold air—and then a voice that made my stomach drop.
“Where the hell is my sister?”
Dagger.
I scrambled out of bed, my heart pounding for an entirely different reason now.
T.J.’s flannel was somewhere in the kitchen, buttons scattered across the floor, so I grabbed the first thing I could find—a folded T-shirt on the dresser.
It hit me mid-thigh, barely decent, but I didn’t have time to care.
I yanked open the bedroom door and hurried down the hall.
Dagger stood in the doorway, snow dusting his shoulders, his face tight with worry that shifted to shock the moment he saw me. His eyes traveled from my bare legs to T.J.’s shirt to my disheveled hair, and I watched the pieces click into place.
“Charisma.” He said my name like he wasn’t sure whether to be relieved or furious. “What the hell is going on? I saw your car next to that stupid bear mailbox on the ground and I thought—” He stopped, his jaw working. “I thought something happened to you.”
“Something did happen to me.” I moved to stand beside T.J., close enough that our arms brushed. “But not the kind of something you’re thinking.”
Dagger’s gaze cut to T.J., sharp and assessing. They were roughly the same height, but T.J. had broader shoulders, more bulk. Not that Dagger looked intimidated. If anything, he looked like he was calculating exactly how many punches it would take to lay this guy out.
“Who are you?” Dagger asked, eyes narrowing at the man beside me.
“T.J. Jernigan.” T.J.’s voice was calm and steady. “Your sister hit my mailbox in the storm last night. Roads were impassable. I gave her a place to stay.”
“Looks like you gave her more than that.”
The words hung in the air, heavy with implication. I felt my cheeks burn, but before I could say anything, T.J. stepped forward.
“Yeah,” he said. “I did.”
Dagger’s hands curled into fists at his sides. “You want to explain to me why I shouldn’t knock your teeth down your throat right now?”
“Because your sister is a grown woman who makes her own choices. And because I’m not going anywhere.
” T.J. held Dagger’s stare without flinching.
“I know how this looks. Stranger in the woods, your sister shows up in a crisis, one night together. I get why you’d want to hit me.
But I’m telling you right now—this isn’t a one-night thing. Not for me.”
My breath caught.
Dagger’s eyes narrowed. “You’ve known her for what, twelve hours?”
“Doesn’t matter.”
“The hell it doesn’t.”
“It doesn’t.” T.J.’s voice dropped, rough and certain.
“I spent three years on this mountain not feeling a damn thing. Then she showed up on my porch, freezing and crying and apologizing for hitting my mailbox when she should’ve been furious at a world that treated her like garbage for defending herself.
And something in me woke up.” He glanced at me—just for a second—and what I saw in his eyes made my chest ache.
“I’m not letting her go. Not now. Not ever.
So you can hit me if you need to, but it’s not going to change anything. ”
The silence stretched between them, thick with tension.
I watched Dagger’s jaw work as he weighed his options.
He was protective—I’d learned that much in the few months since we’d found each other.
Growing up in foster care had done something to him, made him fierce about the family he’d never had.
I understood it because I felt the same way.
Finally, Dagger let out a long breath. His fists unclenched.
“You hurt her,” he said quietly, “and I will end you. We clear?”
“Crystal.”
They stared at each other for another beat. Then Dagger nodded once, short and sharp, and some of the tension bled out of the room.
“Coffee?” T.J. asked.
“Yeah. Coffee would be good.”
T.J. moved toward the kitchen, leaving me alone with my brother in the doorway. Dagger looked at me—really looked—and his expression softened into something almost vulnerable.
“You okay, Ris?”
The nickname hit me somewhere tender. He’d started calling me that at Christmas, said it felt right, and every time he used it, I had to blink back the sting of tears. Twenty-three years without a family, and now I had a brother who’d driven through a snowstorm to look for me.
“I’m okay,” I said. “Better than okay, actually.”
“Yeah?” He studied my face like he was looking for cracks. “Because when you called me yesterday, you sounded like your whole world was falling apart.”
Yesterday. God—was it only yesterday? The video, the comments, the frantic drive through the storm—it felt like a lifetime ago.
“It was,” I admitted. “But then I hit a bear, and everything changed.”
Dagger blinked. “You’re going to have to explain that one.”
“Later.” I stepped forward and wrapped my arms around him, pressing my face into his shoulder. He hugged me back, tight and fierce, and for a moment I let myself just be held by my brother. “Thank you for coming to find me.”
“Always,” he said roughly. “That’s what family does.”
Family. The word still felt foreign on my tongue, but it was starting to fit. Starting to feel like something I could believe in.
From the kitchen came the sound of the coffeemaker gurgling to life.
I pulled back from Dagger and glanced toward the kitchen, where T.J.
moved around with easy familiarity—pulling mugs from cabinets, completely unbothered by the fact that he’d just declared his intentions to a stranger who’d wanted to punch him.
And that’s when it hit me.
The doubt. The fear. The ugly voice in the back of my head that had been whispering since the moment I woke up.
You just met him. You slept with him after knowing him for a few hours.
You gave him something you’ve never given anyone, and now you’re standing here in his shirt like this means something—but what if it doesn’t?
What if you imagined the connection because you were desperate and lonely and he was kind?
I’d spent my whole life being reduced to my curves.
Being looked at, commented on, grabbed. I’d kept everyone at arm’s length because no one had ever proven they wanted more than what was on the surface.
And now, in the span of one night, I’d let all those walls come crashing down for a man I barely knew.
What if I’d made a mistake?
T.J. appeared in the kitchen doorway, two mugs in hand. He started to say something, then stopped. His eyes found mine, and whatever he saw there made his expression shift.
“Dagger,” he said, without looking away from me, “give us a minute.”
My brother glanced between us, reading the room. “I’ll be on the porch.”
The door closed behind him. T.J. set the mugs on the side table and crossed to where I stood, stopping close enough that I had to tilt my head back to meet his eyes.
“Talk to me.”
I shook my head, not trusting my voice.
“Charisma.” He cupped my face in both hands, his thumbs brushing my cheekbones. “Whatever’s going on in your head right now, say it. I’d rather hear it than watch you disappear behind your eyes.”
The words tumbled out before I could stop them. “What if this was a mistake? What if I’m just—what if you just wanted—”
I couldn’t finish. Couldn’t make myself say it out loud.
Something fierce flashed in his eyes. “You think last night was just physical for me?”
“I don’t know,” I whispered. My voice cracked. “I don’t know how to tell the difference. No one’s ever wanted anything else from me.”
He was quiet for a moment. Then he leaned down, looking me in the eye, and when he spoke, his voice was low and rough and absolutely certain.
“I spent three years not wanting anything. Not connection, not comfort, not another human being within ten feet of me. Then you knocked on my door, and I took one look at you and knew my life was never going to be the same.”
His thumbs stroked my cheeks, gentle despite the intensity in his voice.
“It’s not your body, Charisma,” he continued.
“I mean—yes, your body is—” He let out a breath that was almost a laugh.
“But that’s not why I can’t let you go. It’s you.
The woman who walked up a driveway in the snow to tell a stranger she hit his mailbox.
The woman who stood up for herself even when the whole world told her she was wrong.
The woman who showed me a video of her worst moment because she trusted me to see her.
That’s what I want. That’s what I’m choosing. If you’ll let me.”
The tears spilled over. I couldn’t help it. No one had ever said anything like that to me. No one had ever seen me—really seen me—and wanted to stay.
“I’m scared,” I whispered.
“I know.” He kissed my forehead, soft and lingering. “Be scared. I’ll wait. I’m not going anywhere.”
I pulled back just enough to look at him. This gruff, solitary man who’d spent three years hiding from the world. Who’d opened his door to a stranger in a snowstorm. Who’d just told my brother—a man he’d never met—that he wasn’t letting me go.
“I don’t want to go back to Springfield,” I said.
“Then don’t.”
“I don’t have anywhere to live. I don’t have a job. I don’t have anything except a viral video and a car that’s probably buried in snow.”
“You have a brother who wants you here. You’re in a cabin that’s got plenty of room.” He paused, something warm flickering in his eyes. “You have me. If you want me.”
I thought about all the reasons this was crazy. I’d known him less than a day. I’d just fled my entire life. The internet was still tearing me apart, and I had no plan, no savings, no safety net.
But I also thought about the way he’d looked at me last night. The way he’d been angry on my behalf. The way he’d touched me like I was precious—like I mattered—like I was more than a body to be used.
“Yeah,” I said, my voice steadier than I expected. “I want you.”
His smile was slow and devastating. “Good. Because I was going to work my ass off until I convinced you.”
He kissed me then, slow and deep. When we finally broke apart, I was smiling against his mouth.
“We should probably let my brother back in before he freezes to death,” I said.
“Probably.” T.J. didn’t move. His arms stayed wrapped around me, solid and warm. “Or we could make him wait another five minutes.”
“T.J.”
“Fine.” He pressed one more kiss to my forehead, then released me with obvious reluctance. “But after he leaves, I’m taking you back to that bedroom and showing you exactly how much I want more than your body.”
Heat flooded my cheeks. “Promise?”
He grinned, slow and wicked. “Promise.”
I opened the door to let Dagger back in, and as the three of us settled around the kitchen table with coffee and the quiet hush of falling snow outside, I realized something.
For the first time in my life, I wasn’t running from anything.
I was running toward something.
And it felt like home.