Chapter Seven
Briar
Rafe moves quietly in the morning. He always does.
I watch him from the bed, my body wrapped in blankets, eyes following the slow rhythm of his steps. He stokes the fire. He kneels to tie his boots. He slices something on the counter, the blade tapping wood in a steady pattern.
He’s calm. Which means I can settle.
I let my eyes move over him the way I never let myself before. The breadth of his shoulders. The way his shirt pulls across his back when he reaches for the kettle. The steadiness of his hands—those big, careful hands that have never once taken anything from me.
Something warm and unfamiliar moves through my chest and settles lower, and I go very still, frightened by it.
Not because it feels like danger. Because it doesn’t.
I don’t know what to do with wanting. It feels dangerous in a different way.
I’ve never been safe enough to find out.
I pull the blanket tighter and look away before he catches me looking.
My face burns when I think about last night, and I duck my chin deeper into my chest. But the feeling under the heat isn’t shame.
It’s something smaller and warmer. My mouth remembers him.
The weight of him. The heat. The way he let me have all the control.
The way his body answered mine without turning cruel.
No yanking my hair. No holding my head down.
That is what stays with me most. Not fear.
Relief. My heart rate slowed almost at once.
The shaking eased. The panic left me in pieces.
And under all of that was something I still don’t know how to name.
I liked making him feel good. I liked that he let me give without taking anything from me. I liked the quiet power of it.
And I want to do it again.
I want him. All of him.
Not because he saved me, but because he’s a good man.
When he notices I’m awake, he gives me that soft half-smile. The kind that asks nothing. The kind that says he’s glad I’m here.
“Morning, sweetheart.” His voice is warm. Soft. Safe.
I sit up, pulling the blanket tight around me. My chest aches from yesterday’s panic. My limbs feel heavy. But I watch him, waiting for him to tell me what he needs from me.
He turns toward me, hands wiping on a cloth. “There’s a clan supper tonight. I want to take you with me.”
My heart drops so fast I sway.
No.
No people.
No eyes.
No noise.
I shake my head hard as I grip the blanket until my fingers ache.
Rafe steps closer—but slow, always slow—and crouches so we’re level.
“Nobody will touch you. Nobody will make you speak. Nobody will hurt you.” His hand lifts, open and waiting. “You’ll be with me the whole time.”
I shake my head again, faster this time. Tears sting. My chest tightens until it feels like punishment. My body folds inward on instinct.
He reaches for the pencil and sets the paper between us.
I write with shaking hands. NO EYES. HIDE.
The words break. My breathing breaks with them.
He studies what I wrote, then looks up at me with eyes that see far too much. “You don’t have to hide anymore. You’re not trapped. And you’re not doing this alone.” He touches his chest. “I’ll be right beside you.”
My eyes burn. I lift my hands to him—instinctive apology, fear, plea all tangled together.
“Hey,” he brushes my hair back with the lightest touch. “Sweet girl… I’m not asking you to be brave for me. I’m showing you you’re not alone.”
Alone. The word scrapes something deep inside me.
I dip my forehead to his shoulder. It’s easier to be myself here. Easier to believe things can change.
He rests his hand on my back. “We go for a bit. If anything scares you, we leave. No questions. I just want you to try. Mama Rue will be there.”
My fingers curl into his shirt. I nod once—small, scared, but real.
His hand slides down to hold mine, palm warm, steady. “Good girl,” he says quietly. “I’m proud of you.”
The words sink deep, deeper than I expect. I rise with him, my legs unsteady. He offers his arm. I take it, gripping tight, so we can face the new day together.*****
Later, we get ready and leave for the clan dinner. Outside, the air is cool against my skin. The world feels too big. Too bright. Too loud in ways my body remembers as danger.
I hold Rafe’s wrist with both hands, my heartbeat thundering beneath my ribs.
He covers my fingers with his own. “I’m right here. Every step.”
After a few minutes, the clearing opens around us before I’m ready. Voices. Footsteps. Firelight flickering against faces I don’t know.
My chest tightens at the sight of so many bodies moving at once. Every instinct screams at me to drop low, curl small, disappear. But Rafe’s arm is warm under my hands, steady enough that I stay on my feet.
Everyone turns to look. That alone almost drops me to my knees.
Rafe leans down, murmuring against my temple. “You’re alright. Nobody here means you harm.”
But my body doesn’t know what harmless looks like. Moving half a step behind him anyway, I slide my cheek between his shoulder blades.
Mercy sees me first. She peels away from the others and comes slow, careful not to box me in.
“Hey,” she says.
That’s all. Something in my chest eases anyway. I lean harder into Rafe.
Mercy glances at him, then back at me. “You did good coming. I’m glad you’re here.”
Mama Rue steps up, her cane digging into the dirt. She looks me over from head to foot, not unkind, not soft either. This woman sees everything.
“Mm… scared, but standing.” Her eyes meet mine. “That’s enough for today.”
The knot in my chest pulls tighter. Not from fear. From how badly I want to believe her.
Mercy takes a warm plate of food from near the fire and holds it out. “Here.”
As I stare at it, she waits patiently. Rafe shifts beside me, broad and warm, there if I fold. My fingers tighten on his arm.
Mama Rue snorts softly. “Girl, nobody here’s gonna make you earn supper.”
Heat rushes into my face. I don’t know if she means to be kind, but somehow she is.
Mercy keeps her hand out until I finally take the plate. My fingers shake. I expect someone to tell me to sit somewhere specific. To thank them. To return the kindness.
A woman with long auburn hair reaches over, drags a chair out with her boot, and leaves it angled near the edge of the group instead of in the middle. “There,” she says. “If you want it.”
I look at the chair. Then at Rafe.
He lowers his head toward me. “Your choice.”
That almost undoes me.
I clutch the plate to my chest for one second before I remember food is meant to be eaten. When I look up, Mama Rue is watching me.
“She ain’t broken,” she says, like she’s correcting the air itself. “She’s learning what safe feels like.”
Nobody answers her because they don’t need to.
I swallow air that burns going down.
Someone sets a warm roll on my plate. I stare at it, waiting for the trick. Waiting for the snap of a hand around my wrist. Waiting for the command that always followed being given something.
Nothing happens.
Rafe shifts slightly so he’s half in front of me, half beside me, letting me use him as a shield without making it look like I’m hiding.
His body heat helps. His smell helps. His breath, steady and slow, helps.
I’m worried how attached to him I already am.
But I guess that’s normal when a person becomes the only safe place you’ve had in years.
I lean against him because my legs threaten to fold.
My body settles the second his weight grounds me.
Mama Rue’s voice brushes my ear again, low and sure. “You survived every day built to break you. That makes you strong, child. The mountain’s proud. And so am I.”
I can’t speak, but my eyes burn. I press the roll to my chest before holding it out—unsure if I’m supposed to eat it now or wait for permission.
Rafe places his hand over mine, guiding it toward my mouth gently. “Eat. If you want to.”
I lift the roll to my lips, and take a bite. The world doesn’t fall apart. For one small moment… I think maybe I won’t either. The clan’s voices blend into a low hum around me. Rafe’s warmth keeps my knees steady.
The roll sits in my stomach, unfamiliar but good. For a moment, the world feels almost quiet.
Then metal hits the ground.
A cast-iron pot slips from someone’s hands and crashes. The sound cracks through the clearing. My body reacts at lightning speed, knees buckling. My fingers claw into Rafe’s arm. My throat strains, trying to scream, but no sound comes.
The world narrows fast, collapsing into a single point of white-hot terror. My vision tunnels as my chest crushes in on itself.
No. No. No.
My hands lift defensively over my head—automatic, practiced, burned into my bones. My back curls. My shoulders hunch. Everything inside me folds small, waiting for the hit that always came next.
Someone says my name. Someone else gasps. Boots shuffle in the dirt. All of it filters through water. None of it reaches me.
I can’t breathe. I can’t think. I can only remember without remembering.
Hands once grabbed after that sound. Hands once punished after that sound. Hands once dragged me inside after that sound.
I choke on air.
Rafe tries to reach me—I feel the shift of his body—but my mind has already snapped into escape. A tiny, strangled noise tears out of my chest as I rip my hands free from him, stumbling backward.
He speaks, but I don’t hear it. I don’t hear anything except the ringing in my skull.
With my mouth hanging agape in horror, I turn on my heel and run.
My feet pound the ground as the clearing blurs behind me. Branches scrape my arms. Leaves whip my skin. I don’t feel pain. I don’t feel cold. I feel nothing but the need to get away before the dark swallows me again.
Even as my legs ache, and my vision swims, I don’t stop.
I sprint through the trees until the shapes of cabins disappear. I don’t know the path, but my body remembers the way home anyway—back to the warmth, the quiet, the single space where the world hasn’t hurt me.
I slam into Rafe’s cabin door with shaking hands, shove it open, and fall inside. The floor hits my knees. I curl into the corner before the door swings shut. Arms over my head. The reality of what happened spirals over my skin.
My fingers scrabble across the floor until they find the paper and pencil. I grip the pencil too hard—it breaks. I grab another. My hands shake. My tears blur the page.
I write: SORRY SORRY SORRY
The words smear as I drag the pencil again: brOKEN BAD GIRL
My ribcage hurts. My throat burns with the scream I can’t make. I lower my forehead to the floorboards and rock, trying to make my body disappear. Then I crawl under Rafe’s bed and shake.
I don’t hear the footsteps until the door bursts open.
I flinch so hard my forehead cracks against the floor. Pain blooms. My hands shoot up over my head. My breath stutters into broken gasps. I try to stop crying but the tears keep spilling, wetting the wood beneath me.
Heavy footsteps cross the room. Fast. Then stop.
“Briar.” Rafe’s voice is rough and shaken—not with anger but something deeper. My chest tightens. He kneels beside me, close but not touching. The warmth of his body pulls around my shaking bones. He lowers himself until he’s almost level with me on the floor.
“Sweet girl,” he whispers. “You can come out. I’ve got you.”
I shake my head, curling tighter, gripping the paper against my chest. The pencil smears across my fingers. The words I wrote blur beneath tears.
Rafe sees them.
The lines of his forehead deepen—sharp, pained. Not at me. For me.
“Hey… no.” His hand moves toward me, then stops an inch away. “Briar, look at me.”
I can’t. I can’t show him what I am. What he took from the woods. What isn’t worth protecting. Pressing my forehead to the floor again, I rock faster, straining around a silent scream. My ribs ache with it.
He shifts, lowering himself fully to the ground, stretching out beside me. His voice drops even softer. “You didn’t do anything wrong. Not one thing.”
My shaking won’t stop. A sob fights its way up—silent but so sharp it feels like breaking. My hands claw at the air, searching for proof he isn’t a ghost who disappears when I close my eyes.
He takes that as his permission.
Slowly… slowly… he touches my back. Barely a palm. Barely weight. Just warmth.
I freeze, waiting for the strike.
It never comes.
His thumb moves in a small circle meant to calm, not command. His breath evens, slow and steady, handing me a rhythm to follow.
“You’re learning,” he soothes. “Not broken.”
A new sob tears through me, softer this time, but too heavy to hold alone. I turn my head toward him without meaning to. My eyes find his—dark with worry, with tenderness, with trust I’m not that good at giving him yet.
He opens his arms a little, and I crawl into him.
He gathers me carefully, lifting me into his lap, wrapping the blanket around both of us. I bury my face in his throat, my tears soaking into his skin. His arms tighten, strong but gentle, holding me together while I shake.
“There you go,” he whispers. “Let it out. I’ve got you.”
I clutch at him, terrified he’ll let go if I stop crying. He doesn’t.
“You’re not bad,” he soothes into my hair. “You’re not broken. And you’re not alone.”
His hand finds mine under the blanket. He guides it to his chest—where his heartbeat thuds steady, unafraid. “You feel that? That’s me. I’m right here.”
My fingers flatten as my body settles into him, remembering safety better than my mind does.
When the tremors finally slow, he kisses the top of my head. “I’m proud of you for coming,” he whispers. “That’s all that matters.”
I close my eyes and press my palm harder to his heart.
And for the first time since the woods… the shame eases.