23. Hannah
HANNAH
Iwalk up the gravel drive to Alaric's house under heavy low clouds. My boots crunch the stones. It's time I found out the truth. My choice. No one called me here. After days of turning over every scrap of truth I could find, I simply came because staying away felt worse than facing him.
The light casts a warm circle on the weathered boards. I stop and knock twice, firm with confidence. Inside, footsteps move, then pause. The door slowly opens, and Alaric stands there, shock crossing his face.
"Hannah," my name said with caution. "Come in if you want."
I step through the doorway. He closes the door behind me but keeps distance between us. I take off my coat and hang it on the hook, then turn to face him, lamplight pools on the rug.
"I read it," I say, pulling the papers from my pocket and setting them on the low table. "Every bit. You laid it out straight."
He nods once, hands at his sides. "Every word is true."
I sit on the bottom of the staircase. He remains standing a fair distance away, giving the space I need.
My chest feels tight, but I push the words out anyway.
"The worst part wasn't learning what you are.
It was realizing you chose for me, the same way Gregory used to.
It's a type of control dressed up as care. "
Alaric shifts his jaw, but he doesn't look away. "Yes. I told myself it was protection. It wasn't. I was wrong, and I'm sorry."
The apology seems simple and bare. No explanations. My shoulders drop with ease at how easy that was.
I lean forward, elbows to knees. "Tell me. The woman you lost. Who was she?"
He moves to the opposite chair and sits, elbows on his knees. "Her name was Renee. We met in another life, another town. She died because of the world I lived in then. Hunters. The grief was real. It carved out pieces of me."
I study his face, searching for any familiar evasion. "And the bond?"
"It's a pull. A recognition. It doesn't own you. It doesn't command you. It doesn't mean you owe me anything you don't freely give. Your choices stay yours. Always."
The room shrinks with the air thickening. I cross to the window, looking out at the dark trees swaying in the wind. He stays seated. I appreciate that more than I can say right now.
"I'm still angry. And scared. But Nathan's story isn't adding up. Elspeth's notes prove there's more to what he's saying. I'm done letting him convince me otherwise."
I turn back. Alaric watches me, patient. I walk over and stop in front of him. "I'm choosing to believe you. Not because everything feels safe again. It doesn't. But because I want to walk into the rest of this with open eyes. With you."
He rises slowly, careful. "Then we do it together."
I reach up and touch his face, my thumb brushing the line of his jaw. He leans into the contact but lets me lead. I kiss him first, tentative, then deeper when he answers with the same measured hunger. His hands settle at my waist, light, ready to release if I pull away. I don't.
The tension snaps between us halfway up the staircase. I back him against the banister, my fingers twisted in the front of his shirt, and he lets me. No rush. No demand. Just the steadiness of his body under my palms and the way his breath catches when I press closer.
I pull the hem of his shirt free and slide my hands underneath, mapping the cool firmness of his skin.
He exhales sharply when my nails graze lower.
I push the fabric up and off; it drops to the steps behind us.
My sweater follows, then my shirt. His hands trace the line of my ribs, and the dip of my waist.
I straddle his thigh on the next step, grinding down against his cock through our remaining clothes.
The friction is rough, but it's not enough.
I rock again, chasing pressure, and he grips my hips to steady me, thumbs pressing into the hollows above my hipbones.
His mouth finds my throat, teeth scraping lightly before he soothes the spot with his tongue.
"Hannah," he breathes, the word fractured. "Look."
I hold his gaze, and reach between us to open his belt, the zipper, freeing him. He's thick, the blunt head already slick. I stroke once, twice, watching him grind down. A low sound escapes him—half growl, half plea.
He works my jeans open with steady fingers, shoving them down my thighs along with my underwear.
I kick them aside, one leg still tangled in fabric.
He sits on one step and pulls me over him so I'm straddling his lap, knees braced on the wood.
The step digs into my shin, but I don't care.
I sink down slowly, taking his cock with more ease this time.
The fit is tight, a burning pressure that forces my body to yield.
I feel every ridge, every thick slide as I settle fully onto him.
A ragged sound leaves me. His hands flex on my waist, holding me there but not forcing movement. "You feel—" He cuts himself off, breathing mingling. "So fucking perfect. Take what you need."
I roll my hips experimentally. The angle lets me control the depth, grinding down so he presses against that sensitive spot inside me with every motion.
Wet sounds fill the stairwell—the slick slide of my body around him, the soft creak of the wooden steps under us.
I brace one hand on the banister and ride him harder, chasing the friction.
His thumb finds my clit, circling in tight, relentless strokes that match my rhythm.
The dual sensation shreds my focus; pleasure coils sharp and hot low in my belly.
He leans back slightly, one arm locked around my lower back to keep me anchored.
His other hand stays between us, working my clit until my thighs start to tremble.
I lean forward, biting his shoulder to muffle the broken moan that tries to escape.
He hisses at the sting but thrusts up to meet me, driving deeper.
"Don't hide it," he rasps against my ear, voice chopped and desperate. "Let me hear you. Let me feel how you fall apart for me."
The words tip me closer. I move faster, the slap of skin on skin growing louder, obscene against the quiet house.
Sweat gathers at the small of my back. His stubble scrapes the swell of my breast when he mouths at it, leaving a flushed trail.
I dig my nails into his shoulders, leaving crescent marks that I know will be gone before this ends.
The tension builds, merciless. My rhythm falters as everything tightens—my thighs, my core clenching greedily around his cock. He senses it, thumb pressing firmer, circling faster. "That's it. Come on me, Hannah. I've got you."
It hits like a wave crashing through every nerve.
My vision whites out. My body locks down around him in pulsing, rhythmic squeezes, a soaking, fluttering grip that milks him.
A raw cry breaks from my throat. He keeps moving through it, drawing it out until I'm shaking, oversensitive, gasping against his neck.
Only then does he let go. With a guttural sound, he pulls me down hard and holds me there as he comes, pulsing deep inside me.
The sensation drags another aftershock from me.
We stay locked together, hearts hammering against each other, breaths ragged and shared.
Sweat cools on our skin. The wooden step bites into my knee; his arms stay where they are, wrapped.
I press my forehead to his, still joined, the intensity of it grounding me more than any words could.
The hurt from before hasn't vanished. It lingers in the quiet spaces between our heartbeats.
But this—choosing him here, on these stairs, body and trust both laid bare—feels like the first real step across the gap he once created.
We stay like that for long minutes, hands stroking slow paths over damp skin, trading soft kisses that say more than we manage in words.
Eventually I ease off him with a shared hiss.
He helps me pull my clothes back on, careful with the tangles, then dresses himself.
We move to his sofa and I lay in his arms a little longer.
"We need to find the archive," I say into the quiet. "Before Nathan or anyone else gets there first. Whatever answers it holds, we could face them side by side. If you want that."
Alaric's hand stills, then resumes its gentle path. "Agreed. No more secrets between us about this. We start at the old property records tomorrow. Cross-reference what Elspeth left you. We learn it all, together."
I lift my head to look at him. "And if it gets dangerous?"
"We stay careful. But you're not walking blind anymore. We aren't. I got you, Hannah."
I settle back against him, the weight of the day easing into something like solid ground.
Outside, the wind picks up, rattling the windowpanes, but inside the room holds steady.
We are not safe from what waits beyond these walls, neither is Lily.
The larger threat remains. Yet here, in this moment, we have chosen each other without illusion.