Chapter 49
IVY
As if sensing my deep thoughts, I hear Soren closing the door to his office and approaching the living room where I’m seated, papers spread out in front of me as I pull together my latest ad campaign for my client.
He has a grin on his face as he walks up to me, jumps onto the couch beside me and grabs me into his arms, tickling me.
I can’t help but laugh, my skin tingling at his touch.
“Come here, little—”
“Don’t you dare say poison again!” I interrupt, beaming at him.
“…little cheese wheel!”
I laugh so hard I almost snort. “I hate you.”
“No you don’t,” he grins, proud of himself for his ridiculous misdirection.
“You’re right,” I smile back, snuggling into his arms.
Later, despite the contentment of being in his presence, the thoughts are still rolling around in my head.
I feel antsy, and movement helps me to work through things.
Being outside, feeling the fresh air on my skin.
Just having a moment to myself to think helps me to process.
It doesn’t feel particularly important—definitely not a big deal as far as I’m concerned.
The late morning light is stretching across the living room floor in long, soft lines.
The air still holds that calm, settled feeling.
I know it will be mild outside, the sun not yet having reached full force.
The perfect time to enjoy the gentle breeze that cocoons the neighborhood at this time of day.
I head into the kitchen where I can hear Soren pottering around making a snack. “Hey,” I say.
He glances over his shoulder. “Hey beautiful.” His deep voice and lazy smile make me tingle.
“I might go out for a bit,” I say, casual.
Soren looks up from what he’s doing and turns around to face me. His eyes narrow. “Where?”
I shrug, shifting my weight slightly. “Just down the road. Maybe grab a coffee. Walk around a little.” It sounds simple when I say it out loud. Normal. Small. The kind of thing I’ve done a hundred times without thinking.
He watches me for a moment. There’s no tension in his expression. Just a quiet, measured consideration, like he’s already seeing something I haven’t fully registered yet. “You don’t need to go out right now.” The words land gently, but still they jar me.
I pause. “I just thought—” I start, but the thought loses shape before I can finish it.
He’s already crossing the room at an unhurried pace that somehow feels more certain than anything rushed ever could.
By the time he reaches me, his hand is already at my waist. Familiar. Warm. The contact settles something in me instantly, like my body recognizes it before my mind has time to catch up.
“It’s busy out there this time of day,” he says, his voice calm, even. “Too many people. Too much movement.” His thumb shifts slightly against my side, a small, absent motion that draws my focus inward, back to where he is. “You won’t enjoy it.”
I feel my shoulders drop. Because when I picture it—the street, the noise, the unpredictability—there’s a faint tension there I hadn’t noticed before. A subtle resistance. Something that suddenly feels less appealing than it did a moment ago.
“I’ll take you later,” he adds. A brief pause. “When it’s quieter.”
The offer hangs between us. A redirection that feels… reasonable. Considered.
I exhale softly. “Okay.” The word leaves me without effort.
And the second it does, something in my body settles.
Completely. The decision is gone. There’s nothing left to weigh, nothing left to reconsider, nothing left to hold onto.
It’s already been handled. His hand moves up my back, then down again in a slow, steady path.
“Good,” he murmurs. And I feel it. Relief. Immediate. Quiet. Like a low, constant tension I didn’t realize I was carrying has simply dissolved.
We don’t talk about it again. There’s no need to. The moment closes seamlessly, folding into everything else around it as if it never required attention in the first place.
I move closer to him without thinking. My body settles against his as if it’s the most natural thing in the world. His hand is already there to meet me. Steady. Certain. Waiting.
I exhale softly, letting my weight rest fully into him.
There’s nowhere else I need to be. Nothing else pulling at me.
The earlier thought—of going out, of leaving, of stepping back into that noise—feels distant now.
Faint. Like something that belonged to a different version of me.
It doesn’t hold the same shape anymore. It doesn’t carry the same pull. It feels unnecessary, unappealing.
I shift slightly closer, my body aligning with his without effort. And the truth settles in quietly, without resistance. I didn’t really want to go out, anyway.
Later, my phone buzzes from the couch, sharp enough to catch my attention immediately. I turn toward it without thinking, already shifting forward to grab it.
Soren’s hand closes around my wrist. The movement stops there. He doesn’t squeeze hard, but there’s no softness to it either. It’s firm enough that I feel it all the way up my arm. Enough that I don’t keep moving.
“Leave it.” His voice is quiet, but there’s weight behind it this time. No casual ease. No suggestion.
I glance at him. “It might be important.” The words sound thinner than I expect.
His thumb shifts slightly against the inside of my wrist, right over my pulse, like he can feel it reacting.
The phone buzzes again.
For a second, I hesitate.
His grip doesn’t change much. It doesn’t need to. “Sit.” There’s no edge to it, no raised voice, but it lands differently than before. Final. Decided. He doesn’t look away.
And I listen. I sit back down.
My phone buzzes a third time.
Loud. Sharp. Intrusive.
The sound cuts through everything.
For a second, my body reacts automatically, a small shift, a break in focus.
Soren stills, and the change is immediate. His hand leaves my wrist. The warmth disappears. The air shifts. Cold. The absence is stark. The loss of his contact hitting harder than it should.
Then it buzzes again, and even though I should be expecting it by this point, I almost jump out of my skin. My heart hammers in my chest, the shift in the room palpable.
He turns his head slowly toward the couch. Then back to me. “Who is that?” The question isn’t casual. There’s something under it now. Something sharp.
“I don’t know,” I say, breath still uneven. “Probably just—”
My phone just sits there, like some sort of troublesome beacon. As if on cue, it lights up again. A name flashes across the screen. I don’t even fully register it before he’s already moving.
He crosses the room in a few steps, picking up my phone, his jaw tightening as he looks at the screen. “Who is this?” he asks.
I swallow, the name making my gut twinge. “It’s just—someone I used to—”
The sentence doesn’t finish. Because something in his expression shifts. Dark. Dangerous.
The phone buzzes again in his hand. He stares at it for a second. He crushes it without looking away from me. The sound is sharp. Glass cracking. The screen splintering under the pressure of his grip.
I freeze, my breath catching in my throat.
He drops what’s left of it onto the coffee table like it doesn’t matter. Like it never did. “You don’t need that,” he says. His voice is calm again. Too calm. “You don’t need them.”
My chest tightens.
There’s something in the way he says it—final. Decided.
He steps back toward me, slower this time, his gaze still locked onto mine. “You have me.” The words settle into the space between us. Heavy. Unavoidable.
His hand comes back to my waist, pulling me in again, firmer now, leaving no space this time. No room to shift. No room to step back. “You don’t need anyone else,” he murmurs.
And the worst part—the part that makes something deep inside me go quiet—is that it doesn’t feel wrong.
It feels true.
My breath softens.
My body leans into his.
And whatever hesitation was there disappears once again. I don’t reach for it, because I don’t want to.
Instead I stay.
Right where he put me.