4. Edda #2
“Gossip column ran a photo of us from tonight,” Bennett says.
I open my eyes. He’s already looking at his phone, the screen casting a cold glow across his face, sharpening every angle. “The caption calls you a strategic acquisition.”
I turn my head toward the window. The city scrolls past in blurred familiarity, streets I know made distant through tinted glass.
“That’s accurate, isn’t it?”
“No.”
The word lands harder than it should.
I keep my eyes on the window, watching my reflection drift across the glass.
“The arrangement is strategic,” Bennett says. “You are not.”
“I don’t know what that means.”
“Neither do I.”
He slips his phone into his pocket. The leather seat creaks softly as he shifts beside me, and then movement catches in the reflection. His hand disappears into his jacket.
The medal.
Even without looking directly at him, I know that’s what he’s reaching for. The worn St. Christopher medal I’ve caught him touching before, always in quiet moments when he thinks nobody notices.
His thumb presses against it. His jaw tightens, then eases. The car turns onto a quieter street, the silence between us stretching wider in the dim interior.
I should look away. Pretend I don't notice this crack in his control, this quiet ritual he’s never explained and I’ve never dared ask about.
But exhaustion has worn my defenses thin, and something about the way he holds that medal pulls at me.
Not curiosity exactly. Something softer. More dangerous.
“What is that?” The question slips out before I can stop it.
Bennett's hand stills inside his pocket. He doesn't answer right away.
The car passes beneath a streetlight, his face flashing into view, then slipping back into shadow.
"St. Christopher." His voice is quieter than I've ever heard it. "My mother's."
I wait.
For a second, I think he's done talking. Then his thumb brushes over the medal again.
"She gave it to me the day before she died. Said it would keep me safe." His gaze stays fixed on the window. "I've carried it for eleven years."
A faint breath leaves him, humorless.
"I don't believe in saints. I don't believe in much of anything. But I carry it anyway."
The admission settles between us, heavy and unexpected.
I think about the woman who raised this man. The woman who loved him enough to hand him her last talisman and trust him to carry it forward.
I think about my father.
"My dad gave me the shop two weeks before he died," I say quietly. "He knew what was coming, and he still handed me the thing he loved most."
My throat tightens.
"Then he was gone."
Streetlights smear across the window beside us, gold and white against the glass.
"I've been scared of losing it ever since. Not because of the money." I glance down at my hands before looking back at him. "Because it's the last piece of him I have."
Bennett is looking at me now. I feel his attention like pressure against my skin, steady and impossible to ignore.
“You won’t lose it.” His voice carries a certainty that feels dangerously close to a promise. “The heritage designation is permanent. The trust is irrevocable. Whatever happens between us, the shop is yours.”
Whatever happens between us.
The words settle heavily between us, and I turn from the window to face him fully.
City lights move across his face in restless streaks of gold and shadow. His hand is still curled around the medal in his pocket, gone completely motionless.
His eyes are darker than I’ve ever seen them. Unguarded in a way that catches me off balance.
Something shifts low in my chest.
There’s something in his expression I can’t quite name yet, something raw enough to make my pulse stumble.
“Why did you defend me?” I ask. “Tonight. The Brennan Building documentation. You could’ve let Diana say whatever she wanted.”
“I could have.”
“But you didn’t.”
“No.” Slowly, he pulls his hand from his pocket, leaving the medal behind. Like it weighs more than metal should. “I didn’t.”
“Why?”
His gaze shifts to me then, sharp and unreadable for a second before something quieter slips underneath.
“Because she was wrong.”
“That’s not the only reason.”
A flicker crosses his face. Gone almost instantly.
“No,” he says softly. “It wasn’t.”
The car slows at a red light. The quiet that settles between us feels too sharp to ignore.
Bennett is close enough that I can see the faint lines at the corners of his eyes, the slight bend in the bridge of his nose that keeps his face from looking too polished, too untouchable. He looks like a man bracing for impact before it’s even arrived.
“Because you’re not a strategic acquisition,” he says quietly. “You never were.”
His gaze holds mine, steady and unguarded in a way that unsettles me more than his anger ever did.
“You walked into my office with grease on your jacket and told me I was wrong.” His mouth shifts, almost a smile, gone before I can fully catch it. “I’ve been trying to figure out what to do about you ever since.”
The light turns green. The car rolls forward again, but neither of us looks away.
Something shifts between us. A line I had not realized I’d drawn starts to blur at the edges. The careful distance I’ve kept between us loosens under the weight of his honesty.
Bennett watches me like he’s finally figured something out, and the intensity in his gaze makes me want to move closer and put space between us at the same time.
"This is complicated," I manage.
"Yes."
"The arrangement has rules."
"Yes."
"We should follow them."
His mouth curves, almost a smile, like he already knows we won't.
"Should we?"
The car turns onto my street. My shop comes into view through the window, wedged between two polished franchise storefronts that never stay open past eight. The lights upstairs are off.
Home.
The place I fought for. The place I nearly lost.
The place that still feels like my father every time I unlock the door.
“I don’t know,” I admit. “I don’t know what we should do.”
Bennett reaches across the space between us and takes my hand. His palm is warm, dry, his grip careful, almost tentative, like he’s handling something breakable.
“Neither do I,” he says quietly. “That’s new.”
The car pulls to the curb. He doesn’t let go. I don’t pull away.
For a moment, neither of us moves. The city hums beyond the windows, distant traffic rolling past while something quieter settles between us, something that has nothing to do with contracts, arrangements, or strategic acquisitions.
His thumb brushes a slow circle against the back of my hand. Heat climbs my arm, steady and unexpected, landing deep in my chest.
I should go inside. Thank him for the ride. Walk away. Pretend none of this happened.
Instead, I turn my hand in his and lace our fingers together.
“New is terrifying,” I say quietly.
“Yes.” His eyes stay on mine, steady, certain. “Worth it, though.”
He lifts my hand to his mouth and presses his lips to my knuckles, a gesture so old-fashioned it should feel ridiculous.
It doesn’t.
It feels like a promise.
A beginning.
Like standing at the edge of something vast and deciding to jump anyway.
Then he lets go.
I step out of the car and walk toward my shop on legs that don’t quite feel like they belong to me.
I don’t look back. I don’t need to. I can feel him watching me all the way to the door.