Corrian stops by an empty hallway and pauses just long enough to throw words over his shoulder like they're no big deal.
"Of course, your accommodation is included."
"I'm sorry. My what?" I breathe the words out, because how is this getting more intense and weird, when it's been the most weird and intense day already.
He glances back, eyes cool and unreadable. "Room, board. They come with the job, no additional payment required."
I stare at him like he's just spoken in tongues. "You mean…I get to live here?"
He nods, completely unaffected. Apparently standard policy to offer free housing to random emotionally unstable women who show up with lollipops and trauma.
I gawk.
"Like…in the building?"
"No," he says. "Over the ridge."
I squint. "There's a ridge?"
He hums like I'm being dramatic. Which I am. But also…what?
"I didn't see any houses on my way in," I say, because I'm still clinging to reality by my fingernails.
"You wouldn't have." He starts walking again, motioning for me to follow. "It's tucked into the trees. Private and quiet. You'll have your own space for…rest. Whatever you need."
"So, you're giving me a house?" I say, half-laughing because this has got to be a joke. "For watching kids that are special in one way or another?"
"No, you'll have your own space, in our house." His reply is careful, I can hear him choosing the right words. "The building is more than large enough."
I follow in stunned silence, half-convinced I'm hallucinating this entire thing. Room and board? A place with no rent? Hot water? Possibly a functioning fridge?
My apartment has black mold. Skipping over the, sharing a house with five monstrously large and extremely intimidating men, part for a moment. Holy, shit.
Then we hit the glass wall and it sucker-punches me. The idea of that, out there, being mine, even temporarily, is what shatters me.
It's one of those fancy, expensive walls where the windows slide to open the whole room to the outside. He draws it open and the air hits me first. Dousing the cloying heat thats been dogging me since I arrived.
It's clean, a breeze that smells like soil and safety. The light floods through the room, but it's the view.
Miles of unbroken forest, not like the gnarled ones by the main road. It's obvious now they are there is protect, to turn people away, to hide this place. Trees rolling like waves, golden light breaking through the branches, fields of wildflowers wave at me softly. Insects buzz between leaves, making their own sweet melody.
This is something I would add to my manifestation mood board, make it my lock screen, hoping but never getting to actually live here.
It's beautiful. So beautiful it hurts.
I don't get to have beautiful things.
Not since the night my life cracked in half and the red wouldn't come off my hands. Not since I watched my family torn to pieces by something I still can't name, not since the sirens and the silence and the lonely years that followed, a dark fog where most of any good memories are buried.
No friends, no roots, no softness. Just me. And this body I carry like baggage.
I sniff.
Once.
Then again.
"Don't," I whisper to myself.
Please, please, not now.
But the view is too much, the quiet too kind. The warmth too, not mine.
I sniffle. Pulling the sleeve of my hoodie I wrapped round my waist over my hand, I rub my face, banishing the tears away. This is so embarrassing.
When I glance up, Corrian's watching me with a look that isn't smug or sharp or bossy. It's soft.
He knows.
But he doesn't say anything or call me out. He just moves a fraction closer, hand flexing like he wants to touch me but won't, until I give him permission.
So I give it.
Not with words, with gravity. My body moves before my brain approves it, something inside me already knows it's okay, and I lean into him.
Corrian doesn't flinch, doesn't even breathe for a beat. Then, like it's the most natural thing in the world, he tucks me under his arm.
And fuck me sideways, I didn't realize how badly I needed this.
How touch deprived are you girl?
Seeing a man this huge and pressing into one, are two very different things. His chest is solid against me, ribs rising and falling in that calm, controlled way of someone who could absolutely bench press a bear and still make it to brunch. I'm not small or delicate, but next to him? I feel like I could curl up in his pocket and ride shotgun in his life decisions.
The tension in his frame melts the second I settle against him. His jaw unclenches, arm wraps just a little tighter, I've slotted into a place he's been holding open too long. And even though this is objectively insane, he's a stranger, my shiny new boss, and I'm one emotional sneeze away from a breakdown. I've never felt safer in my entire goddamn life.
He holds me while I sniffle against his flannel like an emotionally constipated raccoon. And honestly? It's kind of devastating.
The silence stretches, nice and comfortable.
Which is bad.
Because now my brain catches up, trips over itself, and starts scream-whispering WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING, FRANKIE?!
I stumble back a step, immediately regretting it, but trying to salvage the chaos that is my face.
"Sorry," I mumble, wiping at my eyes with the sleeve of my hoodie, a toddler in crisis. "It's been a long day. And also a long year. And also a really long life."
He doesn't move, just looks with this unreadable expression, cataloguing every breath I take. His eyes drop to the space between us, the one I just created in my panic. He stares at for a beat, forehead creasing.
Then he lifts his gaze back to mine. And for one agonizing second, he looks absolutely wrecked. But it's gone before I can process it.
He straightens, adjusts his stance, slides effortlessly back into that quietly commanding posture.
"It's okay," he says. "Let's get the others. I'll take you to see the place."
Back to business.
So did I completely imagine we just had 'a moment'? Did my heart not just squeeze for a man who may or may not be running a murder cult? Did I not just get fanny flutters?
Cool, cool, cool.