3. The Walls Have Ears #2
My red-thread sight flickers.
For one second, every connection in the room flashes bright and tangled: lovers, spouses, almost. Too many lines. Too much red. Too many ‘couples’.
The edges of the booth blur.
I set the broken fry down with great dignity, as if waiting for ‘Taps’ to play.
Dorian’s hand shifts beneath the table.
Not touching me.
Close.
Waiting.
That almost breaks me.
Because if he asks if I am okay, I will have to either lie or fall apart in front of a vampire mayor, a haunted painter, three tourists from Idaho, and a waitress who is already suspicious of my fry order.
I press my palms flat on my thighs, grounding myself.
Still, the room keeps tilting.
Dorian doesn’t miss a beat.
Not because I gasp. I do not.
Not because I cry. I will not.
He notices the way my fingers curl into the fabric of my skirt. The way my smile disappears. The way my gaze stops landing and starts counting.
His voice cuts quietly through the blur.
“Alistair.”
The mayor pauses.
Dorian’s tone stays mild. Almost bored. “Switch seats with me.”
I turn my head a fraction.
He does not look at me. That is how I know he knows.
Alistair’s eyebrows lift. “But you always sit with your back to the wall.”
Dorian finally looks away from the room. His expression remains perfectly neutral, which is how I know he is doing something kind and trying very hard not to let it look like kindness.
“The angle is bad,” he says.
Alistair’s gaze flicks to me, then back to him. “For whom?”
“For my line of sight.”
This is not even a good lie.
It is a Dorian lie: technically plausible, emotionally evasive, and delivered with enough authority that most people decide arguing is a poor use of their remaining lifespan.
Alistair looks at me.
“I’m fine,” I say.
No one believes me.
It’s a tough table.
Alistair slides out of the booth with elegant obedience. “Of course, Detective. We must all support your line of sight in these trying times.”
“Your cooperation is appreciated.”
Their dry exchange gives my pride somewhere to stand.
Dorian waits until Alistair is out, then shifts the seating arrangement without once saying, Fate is panicking because this room remembers gunfire.
He does not ask if I need air.
He does not say breathe.
He does not touch me where anyone can see and turn compassion into spectacle.
He simply slides into the outside edge of the booth, putting his broad shoulders between me and the room.
Between me and the door.
Between me and the noisy bar, the falling plates, the scraping chairs, the strangers with too many hands and too many stories.
The effect is immediate.
Not complete. I am not magically healed by the proximity of one emotionally constipated detective, no matter how attractive his jawline may be.
But the room narrows.
Softens.
Instead of the whole tavern, I have Dorian’s shoulder. His sleeve. The steady line of his profile. The dark fall of his hair. The solid, infuriating fact of him.
“There,” he says, picking up a menu as if nothing important has happened. “Now I can watch the kitchen door.”
I stare at him.
“You rearranged an entire table because of a kitchen door?”
“It is an active doorway.”
“So is my mouth, and yet you keep ignoring it.”
“Only when it is saying demonstrably false things.”
Despite myself, a laugh slips out.
Small. Unsteady. Real.
The sound surprises me enough that I almost ruin it by crying.
Under the table, my hands are still cold. My pulse still trips too fast. My magic still trembles like a candle flame in a draft. But the worst of the room has stopped clawing at me.
Because he noticed.
And worse, he protected me without making me feel weak.
That hurts in a place I do not have a name for. This is tenderness disguised as logistics. Care hidden inside seating strategy.
The waitress returns with fresh fries and a wary smile. “Everything okay over here?”
“Yes,” I say too quickly.
Dorian says, “We need more ketchup.”
She looks between us. “Regular or emotional support ketchup?”
I press a hand to my chest. “You remembered.”
“I work in hospitality. I remember trauma orders.”
“Marry me.”
Dorian’s head turns.
I freeze.
The waitress laughs and walks away before I can clarify that I meant platonically, condimentally, and without supernatural legal consequences.
Dorian looks at me.
I look at the fries. “Do not start,” I say.
“I said nothing.”
“You thought loudly.”
“I often do.”
Then, under the table, his leg nudges mine.
Not sudden. Not claiming. Just there, between us and the table leg, hidden by the table’s shadow.
An offer. A question.
My throat tightens. This is dangerous. Not because people can see.
They cannot.
Because I want to take his hand more than I want to keep pretending I am fine.
So I do.
My fingers slide into his.
His hand closes around mine, warm and solid and careful.
The panic eases.
Not gone. Not fixed. But loosened.
I draw my first full breath since the plate broke.
And then a new fear slips in behind the old one, quiet and sharp.
Because Dorian Wolfe is becoming the place I feel safest.
And I have no idea what that will cost us if there really is a 'Couples Killer.'
For three heartbeats, I let myself have it. Dorian’s hand around mine beneath the table. Warm. Steady. Hidden.
Mine.
No. Not mine. Absolutely not mine. Mine is a dangerous word with claws and expectations. Mine is how people in Everwilde end up cursed, hunted, bonded, or explaining to their friends why a “casual thing” now involves moon cycles and blood oaths.
Still, his thumb rests on the corner of the table against the side of my hand, not moving, not pressing.
And I breathe.
The tavern noise lowers from threat to background. Glasses clink. Oil hisses in the kitchen. Someone near the bar argues about football with the conviction of a man who believes volume counts as evidence.
Everything is normal.
Which is exactly when my brain decides to ruin it.
People can see us.
Dorian’s body angled toward mine. They can see how he moved seats. How his shoulder blocks the room. How our fingers are now intertwined.
They can see enough.
My gaze lifts.
A tourist at the bar looks away too quickly.
The waitress smiles at another table, but her eyes flick toward us with soft, human curiosity.
Behind Alistair’s shoulder, an old framed painting of Foglight Harbor hangs crooked on the wall, all gray water and dramatic clouds.
A brass vent sits above it, dark slats angled like narrow little mouths.
The napkin in my pocket seems to grow heavier.
The walls have ears.
My fingers tighten around Dorian’s.
His hand answers at once, a small pressure. A question.
I pull back before I can let myself answer.
Dorian’s gaze shifts to me. Not hurt. Not openly. The man has emotional curtains made of reinforced steel. But something in his eyes goes still.
“I need another fry.”
He studies me too intently, but he seems to understand.
I hate that he understands. I hate that it helps.
I reach into my pocket and pull out the napkin under the table, unfolding it just enough to see the ink.
The walls have ears.
I look around the tavern again.
The walls are crowded with harmless things. Black-and-white photographs of fishermen. A painted mermaid above the bar. Old shelves lined with empty bottles, brass lanterns, a cracked ship’s wheel, framed newspaper clippings, and one hideous ceramic gull wearing a captain’s hat.
Normally I would have opinions about the gull.
Strong ones.
Tonight, every object feels like a witness.
The vent above the harbor painting gives a soft metallic tick.
My magic flinches.
The red-thread sense at the edge of my vision flickers.
Threads between couples in the room flash, vanish, flash again.
A husband reaching for his wife’s beer. A woman texting someone who is not the man beside her.
Two college kids pretending they are casual while their knees angle toward each other with embarrassing hope.
For a second, every connection is too bright. Every ear in every painting is listening too closely.
My breath catches.
Dorian’s posture sharpens. “What is it?”
“I don’t know.”