Cara #3
Jasper was across the room in a few steps, and he didn’t say anything at first—just took my face in both hands and looked at me, his thumbs resting lightly against my cheekbones, his eyes moving over my expression with careful attention.
He knew something was wrong. The charcoal coat was back on now, the pocket watch chain catching the candlelight, and he looked exactly like who he was supposed to be tonight—a man who solved things, who showed up, who didn’t look away from difficult situations.
The costume had been more accurate than either of us had planned.
“Hey,” he said quietly. “Talk to me. You were perfect tonight,” he said, before I could answer.
“Thank you.” I meant it more than the words covered.
I looked around the room—the warm candlelight, the empty chairs still in their horseshoe, the blood red roses still dark and dramatic on the table, the cobwebs and the poison bottles and all of it—and felt the evening sitting in my chest in two distinct layers.
He tilted my face up gently. “Something happened.” It wasn’t a question. Something in his expression made it easier to say than I’d expected.
“Eric was in the alley tonight,” I said. “During the break before the third round. I went out for air, and he was standing on the opposite sidewalk in the dark. He was watching the shop. He’d been there a while, I think. He wasn’t passing through. He was waiting for me to come out and find him.”
Jasper’s eyes cut to the front window even though we both knew Eric was long gone. When his gaze came back to mine, it was focused and intent, and I could see the two things moving through him at once, neither one winning.
“How long had he been there?”
“I don’t know.” I kept my voice even. “Long enough to be comfortable. He didn’t look like someone who’d just arrived.
He looked like someone who’d been standing there in the dark waiting to be seen.
” I paused. “He nodded at me. Like he had every right to be there. And then he walked away. Slowly. Like he wanted me to watch him go.”
A muscle worked in Jasper’s jaw. His hands, which had dropped to my shoulders, tightened slightly. I could see him making deliberate choices about what to do with the anger—not suppressing it, just deciding where to focus it. He was controlled and careful and absolutely furious underneath.
“You came back inside,” he said finally. “And you ran the third round, and you nailed the reveal, and you said goodnight to every single person in that room.” He shook his head slowly, something fierce and warm in his expression. “God, Cara.”
“He didn’t get this night,” I said. “I wasn’t going to let him take it away.”
“I know.” He exhaled. “And I am so proud of you for that.” He brought my hand up and pressed his mouth to my knuckles, holding it there for a moment.
When he lowered it, his eyes were still dark.
“And I also want to find him and have a very direct conversation about what it means to stand in someone’s alley in the dark on Halloween night watching her as though she belongs to him. ”
“Jasper—”
“I’m not going to,” he said. “But I want to.” He looked at me steadily. “Next time you see him—anywhere, any context—you come and get me. Not because you can’t handle it. Because I want to be standing next to you when you do.”
My throat tightened. “Okay,” I said. “I will.”
He pulled me in then, both arms around me, and I pressed my face against his chest and felt the anger still in him—the controlled, protective kind—and underneath it the warmth that had been there all evening, steady and sure. His hand moved slowly up my back.
“He doesn’t get to do this,” Jasper said quietly, into my hair. “He doesn’t get to stand in your alley and watch your life like it belongs to him. That’s done.”
I didn’t say anything. I just held on and let him mean it.
After, we stayed where we were for a while, and I let myself have it fully—his arms around me, the weight of the evening finally settling, the tight coil of everything I’d been managing since the alley slowly coming undone.
I hadn’t realized how much I’d been holding until I wasn’t holding it anymore.
That was what he did. He made it possible to put things down.
I had spent a long time being someone who handled things alone, who squared her shoulders and kept moving, and saved the falling apart for later when no one was watching.
And here was this man, solid and warm and entirely present, who had shown up tonight and stayed, and somewhere between the roses and the third round and his mouth pressed to my knuckles in the candlelight, I had stopped bracing for the part where it went wrong.
It hadn’t gone wrong. He was still here. His hand was still moving slowly up my back, and his heart was steady under my cheek, and I thought—not for the first time, and with considerably less terror than the first time—that I was in love with him.
Eventually, I pulled back and looked up at him. “Stay tonight?”
He looked at me for a moment. “Yeah,” he said. “I’d like that.”
I took his hand, turned off the lights, and we went upstairs together.