Three Days

CHAPTER FIVE

POV: Damon

He should have lied better.

That was his first thought. Clean and damning. He should have held the story, kept his face straight, asked her where this was coming from and buried it under enough calm that she’d doubt herself.

He didn’t.

He stood there in the firelight looking at her and the lie just…. It just… stopped working. Like a door that had been holding back water finally giving at the hinges.

“Damon.” Her voice was quiet. Dangerous in its quietness. “Say something.”

“Where is this coming from?”

“Answer the question.”

“Zara—”

“Was there a fumigation or not?”

He turned away from her. Faced the fire. Pressed one hand against the mantle and stared at the flame and thought very seriously about every decision he’d made in the last seventy two hours that had led to this exact moment.

“No,” he said. “There wasn’t.”

The silence behind him was total.

He heard her breathe in. Heard her breathe out. Heard the specific quality of quiet that meant she was working very hard at staying composed.

“So you lied.” Not a question.

“Yes.”

“To Marcus.”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

He turned around. She was sitting very still on the couch, phone face down on her knee, eyes on him. She looked young and certain and nothing about her expression gave him an easy exit.

“Because Marcus would’ve asked questions,” he said.

“About what?”

“About why I wanted to come.”

“And why did you want to come?”

He looked at her. Really looked. At the yellow hoodie and the loose hair and the eyes that had been taking him apart piece by piece since she was old enough to look at him like that and he was old enough to notice.

“Your birthday,” he said.

She frowned. “My birthday isn’t until next week.”

“I know.”

“So that’s not a real answer.”

“No.” He exhaled. Sat down in the armchair across from her because standing felt too exposed. Leaned his elbows on his knees. “It’s not.”

The fire moved between them. She waited. She was good at waiting, he’d always noticed that about her. Where Marcus filled every silence, Zara let them breathe until they told the truth on their own.

“Two months ago,” he started. Stopped. Started again. “Marcus’s birthday. You were there.”

She nodded slowly.

“You were wearing that green dress.” He said it to the floor. “And you were laughing at something, I don’t even remember what, and I—” another stop. “I couldn’t stop looking at you. And I realized I’d been not looking at you for a very long time. On purpose.”

The room was so quiet he could hear the snow.

“Damon—”

“I know.” Sharp. Not at her. At himself. “I know exactly what I’m saying. I know what it means. I know every single reason why this is wrong and I’ve been through every single one of them more times than you’d believe.”

She hadn’t moved. Eyes on him, wide and still.

“I told myself coming here this weekend was nothing. Just, being around. Being normal. Being in the same space without it meaning anything.” He finally looked up. Met her eyes. “Then the snow came and Marcus left and here we are and I don’t—” he pressed his jaw together. “I don’t know what to do with any of this, Zara.”

She stared at him.

One second. Two. Five.

“You have a girlfriend,” she said.

“Yes.”

“I have a boyfriend.”

“Yes.”

“Marcus is your best friend. He’s my brother.”

“I know.”

“So.” Her voice cracked slightly on the word. She pressed her lips together. Tried again. “So what exactly are you telling me right now? What do you want me to do with this?”

“Nothing.” He meant it. “I’m not asking you for anything. I’m not, this isn’t me making a move or saying let’s blow everything up. I just—” he stopped. Dragged a hand down his face. “You asked me a direct question and I’m tired of lying. That’s all.”

She looked away. Out the window. The snow was coming down slower now, softer, like it was running out of urgency.

He watched her profile. The small muscle in her jaw. The way she was gripping the phone in her lap without realizing it.

“The text,” she said quietly. “Whoever sent it. They knew.”

“Yeah.”

“Which means someone’s been watching you. Watching us.” She looked back at him. “Before this weekend. Before any of this.”

He nodded.

“Who?”

“I don’t know.” And that was the truth that bothered him most. Not the confession he’d just made. Not the fallout waiting on the other side of this storm. But someone out there with a phone and a secret and an angle he couldn’t see.

She got up.

He thought she was leaving the room and he let her, was already preparing the particular silence of a man who’d said too much, when she stopped in the middle of the floor and turned back around.

“Two months,” she said.

“What?”

“You said two months ago. Marcus’s birthday. The green dress.” Her chin lifted slightly. “I noticed you noticing. I told myself I was imagining it.”

He went very still.

“I wasn’t imagining it, was I.”

Not a question.

“No,” he said. Barely sound.

She nodded once. Like she was filing something away. Processing it in that quiet methodical way she had. Then she looked at him with an expression he’d never seen on her before, open and frightened and something else underneath it that pulled at him like gravity.

“I have been so careful,” she said. “For so long. So deliberately, exhaustingly careful.” Her voice was steady but her hands weren’t. “And I need you to understand that I can not—” she stopped. “We cannot.”

“I know.”

“Marcus would never—”

“I know, Zara.”

“And Ryan is a good person. Camille is a good person.”

“I know.”

“So we’re not doing anything.” Her eyes held his. “Say it.”

He looked at her. At the firelight on her face and the fear in her eyes and the thing she was trying to hold closed with both hands.

“We’re not doing anything,” he said.

She nodded. Swallowed. “Good.”

She went upstairs.

He sat in the armchair and stared at the fire until it burned down to nothing.

At 2am his bedroom door opened.

He was awake. Had been awake. He heard the soft step in the hallway, the pause outside his door, the specific silence of someone standing still and deciding something.

Then the door opened.

She stood in the doorway in the dark. Yellow hoodie. Bare feet. Hair loose. She looked at him and he looked at her and neither of them said a single word.

She crossed the room.

Sat on the edge of the bed.

Her shoulder was three inches from his and the warmth of her came through the dark like something physical.

“I can’t sleep,” she said. Barely a whisper.

“Me neither.”

Silence. Long and full and trembling at the edges.

Then her hand found his in the dark. Just that. Fingers lacing through his slowly, carefully, like she was giving him time to stop her.

He didn’t stop her.

His hand closed around hers and she exhaled, this long quiet exhale like she’d been holding it for months, and they sat there in the dark of his room with the snow falling outside and everything they’d promised themselves dissolving so quietly neither of them heard it go.

“Damon,” she whispered.

“I know,” he said.

He brought her hand to his mouth. Pressed his lips to her knuckles. Felt her shiver.

“We said we weren’t—”

“I know.”

“So why aren’t you stopping.”

He lowered their joined hands. Turned his head to look at her in the dark. Her face was close. Too close. Her eyes were on his mouth.

“Why aren’t you?” he said back.

She didn’t answer.

She didn’t leave either.

And outside the snow finally, quietly, stopped falling.