Chapter 14
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Noelle
His hand is still on my hip when I wake up.
Loose and warm, it’s possessive in that lazy, half-asleep way that says mine even if no one actually said it.
The sheets are a tangle of limbs and heat and skin that still hums from everything we didn’t stop doing until hours after midnight.
I blink against the pale light seeping through the window. It’s quiet. Not snowstorm quiet, but real quiet. The kind you feel in your bones.
Outside, the world is holding its breath again—but not for the same reason.
Last night was…
God.
Last night was everything.
The way he kissed me like he was starving.
The way he touched me like he needed it to survive.
The way we’d curled up on the couch afterward—bare skin under throw blankets, tangled and laughing through The Grinch like we hadn’t just come undone in every way two people could.
He’d kissed my temple when I dozed off. I remember that. The warmth of it. The safety.
I shouldn’t remember it like that.
I shouldn’t want it again.
But I do.
So much it terrifies me.
I shift, careful not to wake him. His breath fans warm against the back of my shoulder. I should stay still. Should let myself hold onto this for a few more minutes.
But I can already feel the pressure building under my skin—the slow return of reality, tapping like a finger against the back of my skull.
My body aches in all the best places. My thighs are sore. My lips are still swollen. And somewhere deeper—under bone, under skin—something else is sore too.
Something that hasn’t been touched in a long, long time.
I slip out from under his arm and sit on the edge of the bed. My feet touch the cold floor, and I feel it all the way up my spine. A jolt of now.
Of soon.
Of don’t get used to this.
His sheets still smell like us. Like sleep and sex and detergent. Like something that could’ve been more if either of us were the kind of people who let things last.
I drag on one of his hoodies and pad into the kitchen, tugging my hair up in a loose knot. The air out here feels different. Lighter. The hum of the heater kicking on. The faintest drip of melting ice outside the window.
The storm’s over.
The spell is breaking.
I pour a cup of coffee and lean my hip against the counter, closing my eyes as I take that first sip. I try to ground myself in the normalcy of it. The bitter heat on my tongue. The warmth of the ceramic. The distant chirp of birds for the first time in days.
But all I can think about is the way he sounded last night when I told him I wanted him rough. The way he looked at me like I was both the fire and the match. The way I wanted more the second it was over.
And the way I still do.
Even now.
Even knowing better.
I’m still staring into my coffee, replaying every second of last night, when I hear the creak of the bedroom floorboards.
A beat later, Cal’s footsteps pad across the hardwood.
I don’t turn. Don’t breathe.
Then, his arms come around my waist. Slow, warm, and sure.
His bare chest presses into my back, and his mouth finds the side of my neck like it’s instinct.
Like we do this every morning.
Like this isn’t borrowed time.
“Morning,” he murmurs, voice still wrecked from sleep and sin.
My pulse trips. “You’re awake.”
“Hard not to be.” His hands flex at my hips, fingers dipping under the hem of his hoodie—his hoodie on my body. “Smelled coffee. And you.”
The way he says it—like you is his favorite flavor—I nearly melt right into the floor.
I tilt my head slightly, give him better access without meaning to. His lips brush just beneath my ear. Once. Then again.
And I want him all over again.
Right here.
Against the counter.
Against anything.
“I should probably go,” I whisper, even though I haven’t made a single move to leave.
His hands flatten against my stomach, anchoring me. “Probably.”
Neither of us moves.
I feel every breath he takes behind me. Every shift of his bare skin against mine. The steady, delicious weight of his body pressing into all the right places.
“You always do that?” he asks quietly.
I frown. “Do what?”
“Start planning your exit when things feel good.”
His voice isn’t teasing. Just honest, curious.
Maybe a little raw.
I close my eyes, swallowing hard. “I don’t usually stick around long enough for things to feel anything.”
His lips brush my neck again, gentler this time. And lower.
“That so?” he murmurs.
“Yeah.” I force a breath and try to stay grounded in the weight of his arms, the burn in my chest. “And it’s not because I don’t want to. It’s because wanting is dangerous.”
There’s a long pause.
“Yeah. It is.”
I want to turn around. Want to see his face. But I don’t. Because if I do, I might say something stupid like don’t let this end.
And that’s not what this is.
Even if every part of me aches like it could be.
His hand slides up, brushing just under the curve of my breast through the fabric of the hoodie. Not even trying to push it further. Just there. Present and warming me from the inside out.
“I like this,” he says softly. “You in my kitchen. In my clothes.”
The words land like a punch to the sternum.
Before I can reply—before I can even process how deeply I feel it—my phone buzzes on the counter.
We both jerk slightly.
And there it is.
The spell cracks.
My assistant’s name flashes across the screen, along with a dozen notifications that somehow piled up while the world slept.
I don’t answer, just stare at the phone like it’s offensive.
And in this moment, it is.
Then his phone pings next, from somewhere in the other room.
And just like that, the storm is over.
My assistant’s name is still lit up on the screen, glowing like a warning flare.
Behind me, Cal lets out a breath. I hear the shuffle of his feet retreating from where he had me wrapped up seconds ago. The warmth of him gone.
“I should get that,” I say, even though I don’t want to.
He doesn’t answer—just walks toward where his own phone is calling from the other room.
I can feel the shift. Like something in the air has changed. Or maybe it's just me.
The call goes straight to voicemail. I pull up her texts instead.
Jules: Weather’s lifting. Roads are being cleared. Need to talk about rescheduling meetings—some moved to Zoom, some not. You’ve got a 2PM with the gala team. Also…your inbox is chaos.
I skim it all, a part of me already sliding back into the role—fixer, scheduler, handler of everything and everyone.
I’m so good at it, sometimes I forget I never really had a choice.
Cal comes back into the room, tapping out a message on his phone.
“Practice is back on,” he says. “This afternoon. They’re giving everyone a little time to get their shit together.”
I nod. My throat tightens.
The magic’s unraveling.
Reality doesn’t just knock. It kicks the damn door in.
No more storm to hide inside. No more snow holding the world at bay. The sun’s shining through the living room windows now, bouncing off the glass like nothing ever happened here.
But something did.
Something I can still feel between my thighs, in my chest. In the weight of the shirt I’m wearing that still smells like him.
“I should head back,” I say, quieter this time.
Cal leans against the edge of the island, watching me. He doesn’t argue. Doesn’t tell me to stay.
Just studies me like he’s memorizing every inch.
“Right,” he says eventually, quietly. “I’ll drive you to your car.”
“No,” I cut in too quickly. “I’ll call a car.”
The air thickens.
He nods again. Looks away this time.
I pretend not to notice the way his jaw ticks. Pretend my own heart isn’t splintering from the silence.
I start to head down the hall toward the bedroom to get dressed, but pause with my hand on the doorframe.
“Thanks for…letting me stay.”
He lifts his eyes to mine. And for a moment, everything that passed between us flickers there. The want. The warmth. The aching “almost” of it all.
“You’re always safe here,” he says.
My breath catches.
Then I walk away to get dressed in my own clothes.
The thing no one tells you about safe places is that you still have to leave them.