He looked at her instead.
“I’ve been thinking,” he said.
“That’s usually dangerous,” she replied.
He exhaled, almost a laugh. “Yes. It is.”
A beat of silence. Then, in a voice stripped of strategy, he said, “I don’t want to build the rest of my life alone.”
Amara’s heart thudded. “Ethan—”
“I’m not trying to save you,” he cut in gently. “I’m choosing you.”
She searched his face for performance. There was none—only rare, quiet vulnerability.
“I already care,” she admitted, the words leaving her before fear could stop them.
Ethan went still, like he had just stepped into something irreversible. “Say that again.”
“I already care.”
He reached for her as if asking permission with every movement. When his hand touched her cheek, it wasn’t possessive—it was careful, like he was learning how to be soft without losing himself.
“You feel like peace,” he whispered.
“I’ve never been someone’s peace,” she breathed.
“You are,” he said.
And when he kissed her, it wasn’t rushed. It was steady—two people choosing warmth after surviving too much cold.
Not long after, Amara’s past came knocking in a voice she didn’t expect to hear again.
Her aunt called.
“I saw you,” Lydia said, suddenly gentle. “On television.”
Amara met her at a small café near her old neighborhood, arriving early to walk the same street she’d once walked in the rain. Her aunt looked older now, thinner, edges dulled by time and need.
The apology came in pieces at first, tangled with excuses. Money was tight. She was overwhelmed. Amara listened without giving her pain permission to steer the conversation.
Then the real reason surfaced.
