Chapter 43
IVY
Idon’t notice the shift at first.
It arrives quietly, slipping beneath everything else, settling into the spaces between moments until it starts shaping them without permission. Like friction has been removed from something I didn’t realize was grinding.
The days don’t start anymore. They don’t have edges. No second-guessing trails my thoughts.
Everything just flows.
I wake when Soren shifts beside me, my body responding before my mind does, pulled toward him without thought.
I’m not fully conscious—just aware enough to feel his hand already there, sliding over me, drawing me closer like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
Like there was never any distance to begin with.
“Drink.” The word is low, close to my ear. The glass is already there, condensation fresh on its outer surface. Cool against my fingers when I reach for it, even though I don’t remember deciding to move.
Always.
I don’t question it anymore. I don’t think about why it’s there, or when it started. I just drink. Slowly. Automatically. Set it back down where he expects it to go.
His hand follows the movement, sliding along my arm, deliberate, making my body soften without asking permission.
By the time I set the glass down, he’s already moving. Pulling me gently back against him. His arm drapes across my waist like it belongs there. “Up in ten,” he murmurs into my hair. “You’re tired.”
I frown slightly. “I’m not—”
“You are.” A pause. His hand slides slowly up my arm, then back down. Grounding. “You’ll feel it if you wait.”
I don’t argue, even though I hate it and want to fight him. Because I already know he’s right.
Ten minutes later, like clockwork, I feel it. The heaviness. The slight fog. The way my body starts to drag just a little.
And I get up, as per his instructions. Not because I’m tired. Because it feels right.
Because the moment he says it, the world narrows back down into something warm, held. I sink into it without resistance.
I’ve gotten used to eating when he expects me to. The food is usually there before I realize I’m hungry. My body responds the second I start, warmth spreading through me in that same familiar way.
It’s easier to take what’s given than to pause and decide for myself.
And it feels better.
That morning, though, I skip breakfast. It’s not intentional. I just wake up slower than usual, the light already spilling through the curtains in soft, pale streaks. My body heavy in a way that makes it difficult to move right off the bat.
For a while, I stay where I am, stretched out across the bed, suspended in that quiet space where nothing is required of me yet.
Where he isn’t touching me.
The thought comes and goes before I can catch it.
Eventually, I push myself up, moving through the routine without thinking, still wrapped in that strange, detached calm. By the time I reach the kitchen, he’s already there. Coffee made. Breakfast half-finished.
The space smells warm. Controlled. Intentional. Like everything is exactly where he wants it. There’s something about that—about the way he occupies the space before I even arrive—that usually settles me.
But today, it sharpens my awareness instead.
“Morning,” I say, my voice softer, almost tentative as I move past him toward the counter.
He looks at me, and something in his expression changes. It’s subtle—almost imperceptible. But I feel it immediately, like a shift in pressure before a storm. “You need to eat.” Not a question.
I reach for the coffee anyway, wrapping my fingers around the mug, focusing on the warmth instead of him. “I’m not that hungry,” I say, light, dismissive, like it doesn’t matter.
His hand closes around my wrist. Not rough, but firm enough that my body stops before my mind does. His touch is warm, but this morning something unpleasant flickers through me, unexpected and unwelcome.
“That’s not good for you,” he says. His voice is calm, even, but there’s something underneath it now. Something quieter. He’s closer than I realized—close enough that I can feel the shape of him at my back, the heat of him bleeding into me.
“I’ll eat later,” I reply, softer now, less certain, like the words don’t carry weight anymore.
There’s a pause that somehow signals displeasure without the need to make a sound. “No, you won’t.” He says it as a statement, not a conversation starter. “You don’t process things when they happen,” he says. “You circle them later.”
My stomach tightens.
He doesn’t move his hand. Doesn’t tighten his grip. There’s no escalation, no visible demand. He just holds me there, like he already knows I’m not going anywhere. “Sit,” he says.
The way he says it isn’t loud or harsh, but it lands that way, settling into my body before it reaches my thoughts, a command that doesn’t need arguing.
I hesitate. Just for a second. Long enough to feel the tension between what I should do and what I want to do.
Then I sit.
The moment I do, he releases my wrist, like the contact was never the point—just the path to get me here.
A plate appears in front of me seconds later. Already prepared, portioned, decided.
I look down at it, then back up at him, something unsettled in my chest. “I said I wasn’t hungry.”
“I knew you’d try not to eat. But you need to give yourself a chance at having the energy you want.” There’s something in the way he says it that makes heat creep up my spine. Like I’ve been exposed. Read too easily.
I take a bite, and my body responds instantly.
Warmth spreads through me, slow and steady, loosening something I hadn’t even realized was tight. My shoulders drop. My breath deepens. And beneath that, something else—a softer reaction. Quieter.
The same low pull I feel when his hand settles at the back of my neck, when his voice drops just enough to make me listen.
I exhale slowly.
He watches me, his gaze tracking the shift like he was waiting for it—like he knew exactly what would happen the second I gave in.
Then he nods once. “Better, yeah?” he says.
I swallow. Nod. Don’t argue.
Because it is.
The resistance I felt a moment ago has already dissolved into something easier and quieter.
Something that feels right.
I eat the rest without thinking about it. Without questioning why it was so easy to stop resisting. Without asking myself why his hand on my wrist still lingers in my mind longer than it should.
When I finish, I feel different. Settled. Not just physically—like something inside me has been adjusted.
He moves past me then, his hand brushing lightly across my shoulder as he goes. It’s brief. But my body reacts anyway, a soft awareness blooming under my skin where he touched me.
“Don’t do that again,” he says. It doesn’t sound like a warning or a threat. It feels like something else entirely.
He’s already decided it won’t happen ever again.
And strangely, that feels easier.
I don’t have to decide. I don’t have to question. I don’t have to get it wrong, when there’s no opportunity to do so.
I just follow.
And that feels better than it should.