Chapter Twelve
THIS HOUSE CREAKED like old bones. It wasn’t home—couldn’t be—but it was shelter. And after years inside walls that reeked of incense and whispered obedience, I would choose these broken floorboards a thousand times over.
Zara slept curled against her bear, thumb in her mouth, cheeks flushed pink with safety she didn’t even know she’d lost. Malik had one arm stretched across her, already guarding her even in dreams. So young, and already carrying the weight of a man. It broke me every time I saw it.
I tucked the blanket higher over them and smoothed Zara’s curls off her brow. Then I backed out, barefoot, because shoes felt too loud, too unnatural. I needed the ground to tell me I was really here, not back in Gabrial’s house.
The hallway was dark, but I welcomed dark. Better shadows than firelight. Fire meant rituals, pain, men’s voices promising salvation while taking everything.
I drifted toward the back stairwell, pulled by something I couldn’t name. Curiosity. Restlessness. Maybe guilt. Zeke had said I could come down—if I needed something. I didn’t—but I felt the need to see him. That pull was foreign, dangerous. Men weren’t safe. Men weren’t to be trusted. But still…
A sliver of light bled up through the floorboards. I followed it like a moth, heart drumming a warning I’d never learned how to heed.
The steel door stood at the bottom. I hesitated, then punched in the code he’d given me, the latch gave, and sound rushed at me. Laughter. Dice hitting wood. Glasses clinking.
Then the smell hit. Smoke. Whiskey. Sweat. Lust.
It crawled into my lungs, turned my stomach. Not incense this time, not clove and ash, but it carried the same weight—sin, danger, men with too much power.
Still, I kept moving. Just a peek. Just enough to quiet this ache inside me. Then I’d leave.
And then I saw him.
Zeke.
Sitting toward the back of the bar like he owned it, his eyes half-lidded in that easy way that made a man look untouchable. And in his lap—her.
A woman draped across him, laughing, her breasts brushing him, hands splayed across his chest with a familiarity that said everything. She leaned in, whispered something, and his mouth curved. Not polite. Not distant. He smiled.
Something broke sharp inside me.
Heat rose fast up my throat, not shame, never shame, but envy so strong it burned. The fire had warned me of this. Punished me for even less. A sin. A weakness. And still it took root inside me, twisting crueler than any lash ever had.
He looked different down here. Wilder. Sin-soaked. Like the man who had offered me safety on the side of the road never existed. A ghost. A mask. A lie.
I turned, walking quickly, and eased the door shut before it betrayed me with a slam. Then I ran. Up the stairs, down the hall, out the back door, until the night air hit my face humid and merciless.
I pressed against the wall, hands shaking so hard I had to curl them into fists.
I didn’t cry.
Wouldn’t cry.
But my chest ached like it wanted to cave in, like every piece of me—Gabrial, escape, the children, this fleeting thing I’d started to feel for Zeke—was folding under its own weight.
I told myself I was strong enough. I had to be. This world outside was jagged and strange, and I had no map. Trust was a weakness. Love, even more so.
And whatever I thought I felt for Zeke? That was just my broken self, reaching for anything that looked kind in a world built to crush me.
The porch boards were cool under my bare feet, the night air strong enough to sting my lungs, but it wasn’t enough to calm the riot inside me. I gripped the railing, wood biting into my palms, and bent forward like I could force the ache out of my chest by sheer will.
Don’t cry.
Don’t you dare cry.
Crying was weakness. Weakness got punished.
I dragged in air like it might steady me, but all I could taste was smoke still clinging to the back of my throat, laughter echoing like a ghost from below. Her laugh. His smile.
It shouldn’t matter. I didn’t know him. He owed me nothing. But still, something ugly clawed up through me, something I didn’t have a name for.
I pressed both hands against my ribs, trying to hold myself together.
Inside, Zara stirred, a faint sound through the thin walls, and Malik muttered something in his sleep. My heart twisted. I couldn’t fall apart. Not where they could see. Not where they might think safety was just another lie.
So I breathed. And breathed again. Whispered the old phrases in my head—stand still, be silent, obey—but they rang hollow out here.
Out here, there was no Gabrial to satisfy, no fire to appease.
Just me. And this new, terrifying pull toward a man who wasn’t mine, wasn’t safe, and had already reminded me exactly how easy it would be to shatter.
My fingers dug deeper into the railing until my knuckles whitened. I told myself it was nothing. That the world downstairs was his world, not mine. That he could smile for whoever he wanted, and I had no right to care.
But the truth pressed in anyway, I did care. And that truth scared me worse than anything Gabrial ever did.