Chapter 34 Zane
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
Zane
It shows up in the small things over the next couple of days.
Aurora doesn’t startle in any obvious way. She doesn’t jump or gasp or draw attention to herself. If you didn’t know what to look for, you’d miss it entirely. But there’s a shift now, subtle and consistent, her body’s started listening for something it didn’t have to before.
A door opens too fast, and her shoulders pull tight for half a second before she smooths it out.
Boots hit the stairs a little heavier than usual, and her eyes flick toward the sound, quick and precise.
Someone laughs too loudly behind her, and she pauses just long enough to check where it came from before she lets herself relax again.
Then she smiles. Keeps talking. Moves on as if nothing happened.
Most people wouldn’t clock it.
I do.
Because I recognize the pattern. I’ve lived inside it long enough to know what it means when your brain starts mapping exits without asking your permission.
And I don’t like that she’s learning it.
I don’t call it out, though.
Telling someone they’re safe doesn’t make them feel it. If anything, it just reminds them that maybe they’re not. You don’t talk someone out of that kind of awareness. You either give it something to settle into, or you leave it to run wild.
So I quietly change what I can.
It’s not the same as what we did when she first got here. Back then, it was quick fixes… extra locks, eyes on the doors, enough to get through a few nights. Temporary.
This isn’t temporary anymore.
I start with the back windows. Reinforce the frames, swap out the catches for something sturdier. Add a layer of film to the glass so if it takes a hit, it holds instead of shattering inward. It’s not visible unless you’re looking for it, but it makes a difference.
Locks come next. Front, back, upstairs. The old ones weren’t bad, but they weren’t good enough either. I replace them with something tighter, smoother. Less give.
Then the cameras. I widen the coverage, adjust the angles so the alley’s fully in view. There was a blind spot near the dumpster before. Now it’s much smaller, basically nothing. The rear is pretty much all covered.
I reroute the feed so it runs to more than one place. No single point of failure. No easy way to take the whole system down at once.
It’s all simple work. Familiar. The kind of thing that gives my hands something to do while my head runs through everything else.
Finn’s supposed to be taking it easy.
He isn’t.
He moves slower, favors one side when he thinks no one’s looking, but he’s still here every night, still talking, still refusing to sit down unless someone makes him.
Part of this is her.
Part of it is the fact that Finn bled out on concrete because we underestimated how far Cole was willing to go.
Ryder notices everything.
He watches me swap out the back lock one afternoon, leans against the bar with that still, assessing look he gets when he’s already three steps ahead.
“You’re tightening the perimeter,” he says.
“Yeah.”
He nods once. That’s it. No questions, no pushback. Just understanding.
Finn takes longer to catch on when I hand him my toolbox so he can assist me.
“Why do I suddenly feel like I’ve been assigned a job?” he mutters one night when I tell him to start walking people out after closing.
“You’ve always had a job,” I reply.
“No, I had a vibe,” he counters. “This feels like responsibility.”
“Same thing.”
“It’s absolutely not the same thing.”
He grumbles about it for a minute, then grabs his jacket and does exactly what I asked anyway.
That’s Finn.
Complains first. Shows up anyway.
Aurora notices pieces of it.
Not the whole structure, just the edges.
She catches me checking the back door twice one night.
“You already locked that,” she says, leaning against the counter with her arms folded.
“Yeah.”
“And now you’re checking it again.”
“Yeah.”
She watches me, a thoughtfulness settling into her expression. Then she nods because it makes sense, it fits into whatever she’s been putting together in her head.
That part stays with me—how quickly she adapts.
On Wednesday, the bar’s quieter. Midweek lull. Fewer people, less noise, easier to track movement without trying too hard.
I run through the usual checks, then head toward the back room.
The light’s on.
Aurora’s at the table, a stack of Founders Day flyers spread out in front of her. She’s folding them one by one, lining up the edges carefully, pressing each crease because it matters.
I stop in the doorway, watching.
There’s a rhythm to what she’s doing. Fold, press, stack. Repeat. One flyer goes slightly off, and she fixes it, smoothing the edge before adding it to the pile.
It’s something she can hold steady.
I get it.
She looks up and smiles when she sees me, the expression easy but a little thinner than it used to be.
“Hey.”
“Hey.”
I pull out a chair and sit across from her. She goes back to folding without hesitation—the silence between us doesn’t need to be filled.
A door slams somewhere out back, harder than it should.
Her hands stop mid-fold.
Her head tilts slightly, listening, waiting to see if anything follows. When it doesn’t, she exhales and keeps going, smoothing the crease as if nothing happened.
I push my chair back and stand, cross to the back door, check the lock, the frame, the handle. Everything’s solid. I secure it anyway, quieter this time.
When I sit back down, she’s watching me. “You didn’t have to do that.”
“Yeah,” I answer. “I did.”
She studies me, then looks back down at the flyers.
“I’m getting really good at pretending I don’t notice things,” she says after a moment.
I shake my head slightly.
“That’s not what you’re doing.”
“No?” she asks, glancing up.
“No.”
“Then what am I doing?”
“Paying attention.”
She makes a face, somewhere between amused and unconvinced. “That sounds like a trap.”
“It’s not.”
“It feels like one.”
A hint of a smile pulls at my mouth before I can stop it.
She sets another flyer down, a little crooked this time, and doesn’t fix it.
Progress.
“You okay?” I ask.
She shrugs, a small movement. “I’m trying to be.”
“Yeah.”
She watches me again, more directly this time. “You don’t tell people to calm down.”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because it doesn’t work.”
She nods slowly. “Fair.”
She sets the flyer aside completely, hands resting on the table.
“I don’t like that it’s always in my head now.”
“What is?”
“Everything.” She gestures lightly. “Doors, people, sounds. Who’s around. Who isn’t. It’s like my brain won’t switch off.”
I lean back a little, giving her space to say it without crowding her.
“Mine doesn’t either.”
Her brows draw together. “Yeah, but that’s… you.”
I shake my head. “It wasn’t always.”
She looks at me, recalibrating everything.
“I just got used to it,” I add.
Her expression tightens. “That doesn’t make it better.”
“No,” I agree. “It doesn’t.”
She picks up another flyer, folding it slower now, less about precision and more about having something to do with her hands.
“Does it go away?”
I think about it. Everything that came before this. Everything that sticks around longer than it should.
“It doesn’t disappear,” I say. “But it settles. Gets quieter. Stops feeling like it’s running the whole show.”
She nods, filing that away. “I can work with quieter.”
“Yeah,” I say. “You can.”
She looks at me again, hesitating this time. “Can I ask you something?”
“Yeah.”
“Are you scared?”
That one doesn’t come up often. Not in such a direct manner.
I could brush it off. Make it into something lighter, easier to carry.
I don’t.
“Yeah,” I say.
Her eyes widen slightly. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“Of Cole?”
“No.”
“Then what?”
I hold her gaze.
At the way she’s still here.
At the way she’s trying to calm herself inside a life that isn’t simple anymore.
“You,” I say.
She blinks. “Me?”
“I’m not worried about Cole,” I explain. “I know how he works. I know what to expect from him.”
“Then why—”
“Because you don’t belong in that part of the equation,” I cut in. “And you’re in it anyway.”
She goes quiet.
“And that scares you?” she asks.
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t control that variable,” I say. “And I don’t like variables I can’t control.”
She exhales softly, her expression shifting. “That’s very on brand for you.”
“Yeah.”
She leans back slightly, studying me. “You barely know me. Enough to care about me, I mean.”
I shake my head. “It doesn’t feel like that.”
She holds my gaze, then looks down at her hands. “I’m scared too.”
“I know.”
“Not just of… all of this,” she adds, gesturing around us. “But of this.” Her hand moves between us. “How fast it is. How much it is.”
“Yeah.”
“And you’re still here.”
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
I don’t have to think about it. “Because you are.”
She smiles then, softer than before, more settled. Then she reaches across the table, setting her hand over mine. I let it stay there, my thumb shifting slightly against her fingers without thinking about it.
We sit in that way for a while, the noise from the bar filtering in through the walls, life moving on outside this room while we stay still inside it.
After a minute, she squeezes my hand lightly.
“I’m glad you told me,” she says.
“Me too.”
She tilts her head, studying me again. “You’re good at this.”
“At what?”
“Making things feel safer.”
I glance toward the door, the locks, the small adjustments that have already blended into the background.
“It’s just logistics,” I say.
She smiles, shaking her head slightly. “No. It’s not.”
I don’t argue.
Because for her, it isn’t just about locks or sight lines or reinforced glass.
It’s about the fact that she doesn’t have to carry it alone. And if I can take some of that weight without making a show of it, if I can build something around her that holds, then I will.
As long as she’s here.
As long as I can.