The cold slammed into her like punishment. Harper hit the snow hard, knees folding, palms scraping against the frozen crust until skin split under the burn. The shock of it didn't even register. Her body didn't know cold anymore—it only knew fear. It ripped through her chest raw and uncontained, the kind that didn't wait for permission. Breath caught high in her throat, thin and useless. The world blurred at the edges—snow, sky, light—everything bleeding into white. She was shaking so violently her teeth clicked, but it wasn't the weather clawing at her—it was memory, it was them.
The name still echoed in her skull like a blade on steel. Black Maw. Her stomach turned. Her vision tunneled. She couldn't get enough air—every inhale snagged halfway, like wire wrapped around her lungs. Her nails dug into the slush, carving trenches, trying to find something solid to hold onto. There wasn't anything. Only the hiss of wind and the phantom weight of hands that weren't there anymore but still felt like they were—ghosts pressing her down, breath on her neck, Kato's whisper in her ear, low and patient, trying to calm her while he cut her apart.
She gagged on nothing. Her throat convulsed; the sound that came out wasn't a cry, it was a whine torn straight from the part of her that had never healed. The snow around her knees went pink where her skin cracked against the ice. She doubled forward, arms wrapping tight around her middle like she could hold herself together by force. The world pulsed—heartbeat, heartbeat, don't think, don't see, don't remember. But her mind betrayed her, feeding her flashes: the drone of a fan, the sound of her pulse fading in her ears, the smell of alcohol and her own blood, the Black Maw tattoo on Kato's wrist.
Someone called her name. Brock, maybe, or Knuckles. She didn't know. Didn't care. The syllables dissolved in the wind before they reached her. Her body wanted to run but her legs were dead things, locked in place. She tried to breathe—shallow, fast—but it only made it worse, sent the edges closing in, the world narrowing until there was only that voice again, whispering in the dark of her skull—don't fight it, honey. Let it come. Nothing to be scared of—
Her hands flew to her head. The pain behind her eyes was blinding, pulsing hard enough to shake her teeth. She folded forward until her forehead hit the snow with a dull crack, the cold searing into her skin. For a heartbeat she stayed there, breath trembling against the ice, the world silent except for the rush of blood in her ears.
Then the world tilted, and she was back in the basement—steel, blood, and the slow tear of skin under Kato's knife.
Then she screamed.
It ripped through her before she could stop it—raw, feral, the kind of sound that didn't belong to language or thought. It tore straight from the place those memories lived, all the way up through her throat until it shredded the air around her. The snow swallowed most of it, muffled it into a low, broken howl that steamed in the cold, but the force of it still echoed down her spine. She stayed bent in the drift, fists tangled in her hair, forehead pressed into the freezing white as if she could bury the sound, bury him, bury everything he ever took from her.
The scream stopped them cold. They'd been only a few paces behind her—close enough to see the collapse, to watch her fists knot in her hair—but the noise rooted them where they stood. It wasn't a cry for help; it was something deeper, stripped bare, the kind of sound that made the body forget how to move. Onyx's jaw locked. Kier took half a step forward, then stopped. Knuckles' hand hovered in midair like he might reach for her and thought better of it. The breath from all four came in short white bursts that hung and drifted in the wind.
Brock met their eyes one by one. A silent warning—stay.
Then he moved.
The crunch of his boots was the only sound left. Each step deliberate, cautious, as if the ground itself might splinter under the weight of her name. He stopped a few feet from her, the cold biting through his knees as he knelt. Harper hadn't lifted her head; her whole body trembled with the aftershock of the scream, fingers knotted so tight in her hair they'd gone white at the knuckles.
He reached out, slow as breath, his hand hovering for a second over her shoulder before he let it rest there. Just weight. Just warmth.
The reaction was instant. She flinched so violently it knocked his hand away; her whole body jerked like she'd been struck. A choked sound tore from her throat—half-sob, half-animal—and she shrank in on herself, pressing her forehead harder into the snow as if she could disappear into it.
Brock stayed where he was, every muscle locked against the instinct to grab her. The air between them felt brittle, like one wrong sound would shatter her completely. He forced himself to breathe slow—loud enough that she could hear it. In.Out. The rhythm filled the silence, steady and deliberate.
"Harper," he whispered softly. No command, just her name. "It's me."
Nothing. Her shoulders shook, small convulsions that had nothing to do with the cold. He swallowed hard, leaned a fraction closer, his voice breaking around the edges.
"You're not there," he murmured. "You're here. With me. You hear that wind? That's real. That's now."
The tremor in her spine hitched, caught on a breath. He kept talking, quiet, even, grounding himself so she could find him.
"Breathe with me," he said, letting the cadence match the rise and fall of his chest. "Just that. In… and out. That's all you've got to do."
Her fingers unclenched first. Then the smallest sound—half-sob, half-breath—escaped her. He waited until the rhythm of her shaking shifted, the panic burning itself out into exhaustion. Only then did he reach again, slower this time, his hand settling not on her shoulder but at her sleeve, where the contact could be broken if she needed.
This time she didn't flinch as hard. Her head stayed down, but she didn't pull away either. The air between them softened, the wind moving around their bodies instead of through them.
Brock's voice dropped to a whisper meant for just her. "That's it. Right here. I've got you."
Her fingers slipped free of her hair at last, falling limp against the snow. They were trembling so hard she couldn't close them, just small spasms against the ground. She stayed folded forward, breath breaking shallow and uneven, forehead still nearly touching the ground. The moment stretched—wind, breath, the faint rasp of fabric between them.
Then she moved. Not much at first—a sway, a half-crawl born more of instinct than choice. Her hands dragged through the snow as she shifted closer, the motion clumsy and slow, until her hair brushed his knees. She didn't lift her head; she only kept moving until her weight met him and the last of her strength gave out.
Brock barely had time to catch her. The force of her collapse drove him from his crouch, his body hitting the snow with a muted thud. She ended up half-in his lap, her arms folded tight between them, face buried against his thigh. He felt the tremors still racking through her—small, relentless, as if her body hadn't realized the danger was gone.
He didn't speak. Just settled back enough to take her weight, one hand finding the side of her arm, the other hovering near her shoulder. She wasn't holding onto him; she was just there, shaking and breathing and not running anymore. The sound of it—the ragged inhale, the broken exhale—filled the space where her scream had been.
Kier was the first to move. One slow step, then another, boots crunching softly over the crusted snow. Onyx followed without a word, hands shoved deep in his coat pockets, eyes fixed on the small, shuddering form in Brock's lap. Knuckles came last, shoulders squared but jaw tight, every line of him saying he'd rather take a bullet than see her like this again.
None of them spoke. None dared. The air itself seemed to hold its breath.
They sank down around the two of them in a loose circle—close enough that she wasn't alone, far enough that she wouldn't feel trapped. The snow gave under their weight with soft, hollow sounds. Brock stayed still at the center, arms a tentative frame around Harper as she trembled against him.
Harper tried to speak, but at first it was only breath—harsh, trembling gasps that fogged the air between them. Then the words broke through, fractured and raw.
"I… c-can't."
It came out in pieces, barely shaped around the sob that caught behind it.
Brock's hand tightened on her arm. His voice stayed low, steady even as it cracked. "I know," he said. "I know."
Her body folded again, the fight gone. She pressed her face into his lap and the sound that followed wasn't a scream this time but a long, shuddering sob that emptied everything she had left. He felt it through the fabric of his jeans, through the bones of his legs, that rhythm of grief that couldn't find words.
When he looked up again, Calder and Vera stood in the open doorway of the house. Neither moved closer. The wind pulled at Vera's hair; Calder's hands were shoved into his coat pockets. They didn't speak—just stood there, witnesses holding their distance because this wasn't theirs to fix.
Brock let out a long, uneven breath, the kind that scraped coming up. His hand came to her back, then stilled. "Harper," he said quietly, voice hoarse. "Hey. Look at me."
For a moment she didn't. Then, slowly, she lifted her head. Her face was blotched red from the cold and crying, lashes spiked with half-melted snow.
Brock cupped her cheeks in both hands, thumbs brushing the wet there. His palms were warm, almost too warm against her frozen skin. "Right here," he murmured. "With me."
She leaned into the heat, eyes unfocused, breath hitching—drawn toward the only steady thing left in a world made of wind and white.
He kept his hands on her face, thumbs tracing small, steady circles just under her eyes. The contact anchored them both. His voice was rough, but there was no edge left in it—only the kind of exhaustion that came from loving someone who'd run out of places to hide.
"Look at me," he said again, softer this time. "I know what you're feeling right now, Harper. God, I know." His breath shuddered out in the cold. "I will never get the sight of you in that basement out of my head—never. I can still smell that room, still hear the way you breathed there. I thought I lost you in that SUV before we even made it back. I know."
Her eyes flickered, wet and wide. Beside her, Kier's jaw flexed—a small, involuntary twitch as the words hit. The memory of straddling her cold and bloodied body in the back of the Suburban, his hands slamming against her chest over and over, would never leave him either.
Harper tried to speak, her voice splintering halfway through his name. "Brock, I can't—"
"I know," he said again, cutting in before the panic could rise. "I know, and I understand. But listen to me, okay? Please."
He drew in a deep breath, the kind that hurt on the way in. "You've been through so much. So goddamn much. And none of it's been fair. None of it's been easy. I hate the Black Maw as much as you do—maybe more. But the Syndicate's not going to stop. They're going to hunt us to the ends of the earth, you know that. Everyone does. There's no walking away, not yet."
She just watched him, eyes glassy and uncertain, her chest still trembling under his hands.
His thumbs moved slowly, brushing the tears off her cheeks where they'd already fallen. "I'm going to make you a promise, right now," he said. "I'm not ready to die. Neither are you. None of us are. Sometimes you've got to do really shitty things to make it out alive, and I'm not asking you to carry any of that. You can stay here. Sit it out. No one will blame you."
He leaned in closer, his forehead almost touching hers. "But they're right, Harper. The Syndicate's bleeding. The Maw probably outnumbers them now. They can help us. They can help us end this. And when they do—when it's over, and the Syndicate's gone, and no one's hunting us anymore, I promise you—we walk."
His voice cracked on the last word, but he didn't look away. "We put the guns down. We leave this city. We find somewhere quiet, somewhere safe, and we never think about any of this again. Ever."
Around him, the others were motionless. Kier's jaw flexed, a quiet nod of agreement he didn't voice. Onyx sat hunched forward, elbows on his knees, eyes fixed on the ground like he couldn't bear to look at either of them. Knuckles watched with his hands clasped tight, the tension in his forearms visible even through his coat.
Her breath hitched; her hands came up to clutch his wrists where they framed her face. She didn't answer, not yet, but the way she held on said she wanted to believe him.
Brock's thumbs stilled against her cheeks. He leaned in closer, voice rough but certain. "Okay?" he whispered, giving the slightest squeeze, grounding her there. "I promise you. We'll find a little town somewhere on the coast—west, where it's warm, where no one knows our names. We'll get real jobs. Boring ones." His mouth twitched, not quite a smile. "We'll have a goddamn fruit tree in the front yard and a dog that digs up the fence. Maybe a porch that needs fixing every spring."
His breath shook out against her skin. "A life that isn't this."
For a long moment, nothing moved between them but the steam of their breath. Even the others seemed to be holding theirs—three men frozen in the snow, as if afraid a sound might break the fragile thing forming in front of them.
Then Harper's eyes slipped closed, her fingers tightening around his wrists—not pulling him closer, not pushing him away, just holding on like she was trying to memorize the promise through touch alone.
Her eyes stayed closed when she spoke, her voice thin and wrecked but real. "I've… I've never had a dog."
It was so small a thing, but it cracked something open in him. Brock gave a short, broken laugh that turned wet halfway through. "Neither have I." He swiped at his eyes with the back of one wrist, still holding her face with the other. "We'd figure it out. Probably spoil the damn thing rotten."
The sound of it—his laugh, small and wrecked—broke something open between them. Harper's lips twitched, just barely, the shadow of a smile trembling through the tears. Her shoulders softened, the sobs easing into quiet tremors as she leaned into his palms, letting the warmth there hold her steady.
Then she drew a slow breath and opened her eyes again. They were glassy, rimmed red, but steady. "I'm not sitting it out."
Brock blinked, taken off guard. "Harper—"
She cut him off, her voice rough but certain. "No. I'm not sitting this out." Her gaze flicked past him, over the circle of faces—Kier, Onyx, Knuckles—each of them still watching, silent. Her voice wavered but didn't break. "I want to be there. I want to sit in on the conversations and the planning. I want to help. I'm not some damsel in distress. Maybe the Maw didn't plan what happened—maybe that was just Kato and his crew. They're dead. And I'm not. So I'll do it."
The words came out steadier now, the heat of conviction threading through the ruin of her voice. "If it means ending this—stopping the chain of pain and death and darkness—then I'm in."
For a long moment, no one moved. Then Brock exhaled, a low, slow breath that clouded between them before fading into the cold.
─•────
The room was dim when Harper came back to herself. She didn't remember climbing the stairs, didn't remember Brock guiding her there—just the weight of the blankets and the faint hum of the radiator in the corner.
Brock sat on the edge of the bed beside her, elbows resting on his knees, head bowed. The silence between them wasn't awkward—just full. When he finally spoke, his voice was rough, low. "I'm gonna grab dinner. You want a plate?"
She turned her head, eyes half-lidded. "Can I just pick off yours?"
A ghost of a smile touched his mouth, though his brow creased first. After the mess in the yard, the request felt like breathing again. "Yeah," he said softly. "Yeah, you can."
He bent, pressed a kiss to her forehead, and stood. The mattress lifted under his weight, the room colder without him. She heard his footsteps fade down the hall, the low murmur of voices below—steady, familiar.
A minute later, the door eased open and Vera slipped inside, shoulders framed by the faint spill of light from the hallway. She didn't say anything at first, just closed the door behind her and leaned against it, watching Harper in the dark.
Harper's eyes followed her as she crossed the room. Vera's steps were soft, deliberate—the kind that made the floorboards barely whisper. She sat down on the edge of the bed, close enough that Harper could feel the warmth from her leg through the blanket.
"How're you feeling?" Vera asked quietly.
Harper hesitated, then let out a small, shaky breath that almost passed for a laugh. "Better," she said. "Screaming in the snow's… weirdly cathartic."
Vera's mouth twitched at that, but she didn't interrupt.
"Sorry for making a scene," Harper went on, eyes flicking toward the far wall. "Guess that's what happens when you've got a kid amongst your ranks. Can't keep emotions in check sometimes."
Vera frowned, turning slightly toward her. "Honey, no one cares how old you are," she said. "The only thing your age does is make people feel bad you've been through so much in such a short time. It doesn't make you any less of a person, or any less of an asset here."
Harper's eyes stayed on the far wall, lashes low, expression unreadable. Only the faint twitch of a muscle in her jaw betrayed her.
Vera watched her for a long moment, then leaned in, close enough that her shoulder brushed Harper's. She reached up, caught a loose strand of Harper's hair between her fingers, and twirled it absently—an old, grounding gesture that felt almost maternal.
"I mean… look at you, Harper," she said softly. "You're eighteen, and you were in the Syndicate. Not just in it—under their two top commanders." She gave a quiet huff, something between disbelief and admiration. "I've never even heard of a female enforcer with the Syndicate, let alone someone that young. Whole Syndicate-is-now-the-enemy thing aside, that's an incredible accomplishment."
She let the words linger, her fingers still idly winding the strand of hair, giving Harper time to decide what to do with the compliment.
Harper stayed quiet for a long moment, the air between them stretching thin. Then she turned her head just enough to meet Vera's eyes. "Joining the Syndicate wasn't exactly a choice," she said finally.
Vera's brows knit, confusion softening into concern. "What do you mean?"
Harper sighed, the sound catching somewhere low in her chest. Her gaze drifted back to the wall, to nothing.
She swallowed, then started talking. About the Vipers. About who she was before the Syndicate. Her voice stayed low, flat—like she was reading from a script someone else had written about a girl she used to know. When she got to Yard Forty-Two, her hands started shaking. She tucked them under the blanket.
Vera didn't interrupt. Just kept that hand in Harper's hair, thumb moving in slow circles against her scalp.
The words came harder when she reached the compound. The cell. What Brock did. What he made her watch. Her voice cracked once—just once—and she stopped, swallowing hard until she could start again.
"And then these three men—" She couldn't finish that sentence. Vera's hand stilled.
"I know," Vera said softly. "You don't have to."
But Harper kept going anyway. About how Brock saved her. How she hated him and then didn't. How the man who destroyed her became the only thing holding her together.
When she finally stopped, the room felt too quiet. Too still.
Vera didn't speak right away. The quiet stretched, thick but not uncomfortable. She sat still, her hand still caught in Harper's hair, fingers idly combing through it like she was grounding them both.
When she finally spoke, her voice was low. "That's a hell of a lot for one lifetime, Harper." A beat. "And I don't think that's all of it."
Harper's breath caught, the smallest flinch giving her away. She subconsciously pulled her sleeve down to cover her arm.
Vera didn't push, but her tone shifted "Mason told me what happened. With the Maw."
Harper went rigid. Her eyes flicked up, searching Vera's face for judgment, for pity — anything she could brace against. But there wasn't any. Only that calm, steady look that Vera carried like armor.
"I didn't come up here to make you talk about it," Vera said quietly. "I just needed you to know that I see you." She brushed her thumb once over the strand of hair still between her fingers, a small, human motion. "And that it doesn't change a damn thing about how I see you."
Harper swallowed hard, her throat tight.
Vera leaned forward just a little, enough to meet her eyes. "You survived things that should've ended you. And you're still standing. That's not weakness, Harper. That's something else entirely."
Harper didn't answer. She just nodded, a small, shaky thing, and let out a breath that trembled on its way out.
Vera reached up, brushed a strand of hair from her face, and gave it the lightest tug before letting go.
"Good," she murmured.
She sat there for another moment, studying Harper's face in the dim light. The kind of look that tried to memorize someone—like she knew what tomorrow was going to ask of her.
Her voice dropped softer still. "You know… if you decided not to go to that meeting—if you wanted to just stay here—no one would blame you." Her thumb brushed absently over Harper's shoulder. "You've done enough."
Harper blinked, throat working. She didn't answer—didn't have to. Vera just gave a small nod, as if to say she understood either way, and stood.
At the door, she glanced back once. "Try to get some sleep," she said quietly. "Tomorrow'll come fast."
The latch clicked behind her, leaving Harper alone with the hum of the radiator and the echo of that one mercy of a sentence—no one would blame you.
─•────
The house had gone still hours ago. The kind of still that hummed in the walls and made every floorboard sound like a betrayal. Harper padded barefoot into the kitchen, hoodie half-zipped, hair tied back in a loose knot that hadn't survived the night. The only light came from the stove clock—2:14 a.m.—and the faint blue wash of the snow through the window.
She opened cabinets one by one, slow to keep the hinges from groaning. Crackers. Rice. A jar of peanut butter she didn't remember anyone buying. Her stomach twisted, more out of habit than hunger, but she needed something to do. She grabbed the jar and a spoon, muttering when it slipped from her fingers and clattered against the counter. The sound seemed too loud in the quiet.
She froze, listening—nothing.
The tension left her shoulders by degrees. She picked the spoon back up and tucked the jar under her armpit, then turned to leave—
—and walked straight into him.
Knuckles was a wall in the dark. She hit his chest, stumbled back a step, the jar thudding against her hip. For a second neither of them spoke. His shadow loomed over her, familiar, broad, blocking the hall light.
Her pulse spiked. "Jesus, you scared me," she breathed, voice louder than she meant. She started to sidestep, clutching the jar like a shield. "I was just—"
Knuckles shifted, moving into her path, his size filling the narrow doorway. "Harper." His voice was low, rough with fatigue. "We need to talk."
Her jaw tightened. "No, we don't," she snapped, trying to duck under his arm. "It's the middle of the damn night. We can talk tomorrow."
He exhaled hard, rubbing a hand over his face. "Tomorrow's too easy," he said quietly.
Harper stopped, still half-turned away from him. Her glare flicked up, sharp under the dim light. "Knuckles, I don't need another lecture right now, okay?"
"I'm not lecturing you," he said.
"Not yet," she shot back, the words tumbling fast, brittle. "But I can just hear it now—Harper, you're too inexperienced for this. Harper, you can't be risking yourself like this. Harper, you're basically a child, so—"
"Enough," he cut in—sharp, sudden, enough power in it to make her flinch. The spoon slipped from her fingers and clattered to the tile. She froze, breath catching, eyes snapping to his.
But Knuckles' face had already changed. The edge dropped out of his voice, the hardness bleeding into something heavier. "Harper." He swallowed, took a slow breath. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry for what I said in the kitchen that day."
She blinked, thrown by the apology. "It's fine. I forgive you." She bent and grabbed the spoon, before turning for the hall.
He caught her wrist—gentle, but firm enough to stop her. "No, it's not fine." His voice cracked a little. "I was an asshole, and I'm sorry. I shouldn't have—" He stopped himself, exhaled. "I'm really bad at this shit, Harper. I didn't mean to undermine you. You just…" His jaw worked, words slow to come. "Out on that pier, I thought I was about to watch you both die. And I couldn't do a goddamn thing to stop it."
Her expression faltered. He rushed to fill the silence, shaking his head. "And before you say anything—it's not weird. It's just the truth. I love you. Not like him. Just…you're family. And I felt so damn useless that I couldn't help either of you."
Harper looked at him, the tension in her shoulders easing just enough for her to whisper, "I didn't mean what I said. About you thanking me." She swallowed hard. "I was scared and angry and I took it out on you. That wasn't fair."
Knuckles' mouth pulled into a tired half-smile. "No—I do want to thank you." His voice dropped, gentler now. "It was reckless, yeah. But you got Brock off that stage faster than anyone else could have. I really think if you hadn't shoved him off when you did, he wouldn't be here."
She stared at him for a long beat, something unreadable in her eyes. Then she gave a small nod. "You're welcome."
She turned again, stepping toward the hall.
He reached out once more, fingers closing lightly around her wrist. "Harper—wait."
She stopped, shoulders rigid, breath shallow.
Knuckles hesitated, searching for the right words. "I'm sorry for dropping your age in the middle of the kitchen," he said finally. "You're young, yeah, but I shouldn't have used that against you. You're—" He blew out a shaky breath, raking a hand through his hair. "—fuck, it's just hard to remember that sometimes. Especially with what you've been through."
Her head turned slightly, just enough for him to see her eyes catch the dim light. "I don't need your sympathy, Knuckles."
"That's not what this is," he said quickly, voice low. "I'm asking what I can do to fix this. Because we can't keep dancing around each other, pretending the other doesn't exist. I don't know how to fix it." His tone softened.
She stared at him, trying to read the truth in his face—and there it was, open and unguarded, all the hurt and guilt he'd been carrying since the pier. It hit her hard, guilt rising sharp in her chest.
Her voice dropped to a whisper. "Just… be there. Sit beside me during the talks. Have my back."
Knuckles' answer was immediate. "Always," he said. "You know that. I've always protected you, and I'm not about to stop now."
Something cracked open in her at that. She set the jar down hard, the lid rattling, and before she could think better of it she stepped forward—sudden, almost startled by her own movement—and threw her arms around him. It wasn't gentle, more a collision than a hug, but his arms came up around her anyway, strong and certain.
He let out a breath that sounded half like a laugh and half like a sob, the sound catching in the space above her head. His whole body eased under her hands, that constant coil of tension finally unwinding as if he'd been holding it since the pier. "Jesus, Harper," he murmured into her hair, voice muffled but shaking, "don't ever shut me out like that again."
She pressed her face into his chest, eyes burning. Guilt crawled up her throat, thick and hot. "I didn't mean to," she said quietly. "I just—I didn't want you to look at me different."
Knuckles' hand tightened at her back, rough palm covering most of it. "Kid, I've seen you bleed and still get up swinging. Nothing's ever gonna make me look at you different."
Her breath hitched against him. "Stop calling me kid," she muttered, but it didn't have any real bite.
He huffed a small laugh, the sound rumbling through his chest. "Yeah, yeah."
She stayed there, fingers fisted in his shirt, feeling the solidity of him, the steadiness she'd missed. For the first time in weeks, the silence between them wasn't heavy—it was full. She could feel his heartbeat under her cheek, slow and sure, grounding her.
"I'm sorry," she whispered finally.
He shook his head, chin brushing her hair. "Don't be. Just… don't disappear on me again, yeah?"
She nodded into him, the motion barely more than a breath. "Deal."
Knuckles let out a low sound and eased his arms from around her. The warmth between them lingered even as the air settled cold in its place. He reached over to the counter, grabbed the jar of peanut butter, and held it out to her.
"You better come down for breakfast tomorrow," he said, voice gentler now, a hint of his usual gruff humor edging back in.
Harper took it, her fingers brushing his. "I will," she said, and for the first time in a long while, she meant it. A small, tired smile pulled at her mouth before she turned for the stairs.
Knuckles watched her go, the sound of her footsteps fading one soft creak at a time until the house swallowed them. He stayed there a while longer, staring at the doorway she'd disappeared through, then turned back to the counter and started rummaging through the cabinets—anything to busy his hands. The quiet felt different now. Lighter.
Harper moved through the dim hall, the low hum of the refrigerator and the groan of settling wood following her like echoes. At the foot of the stairs, she twisted the lid off the jar, the faint pop loud in the hush. She dug the spoon in, scooped a chunk, and stuck it between her teeth. The salty-sweet hit of peanut butter grounded her in something simple, something real.
She climbed slowly, one hand on the rail, the other curled around the jar. The house was dark but not unfriendly—the kind of silence that breathed. By the time she reached the landing, the heaviness in her chest had started to ease.
The hallway stretched ahead, narrow and half-lit by the spill of moonlight through the window at the far end. She padded down it, soft on her feet, spoon still jutting from her mouth. At the bedroom door, she slowed, fingers brushing the frame before she eased it open.
The room was steeped in shadow, the faintest light sliding through the blinds and across the bed. Brock lay half on his side, one arm thrown over the blanket, the slow rhythm of his breathing steady in the dark.
Harper slipped inside, pulled the spoon from her mouth—clean now—and set the jar and spoon on the dresser, twisting the lid until it clicked shut. The sound seemed louder than it should have been, swallowed almost instantly by the quiet.
She crossed to the bed and lifted the edge of the covers, sliding beneath them. The mattress dipped, the warmth of his body spreading toward her like gravity. She shifted closer until her knees brushed his leg, her face finding the curve of his chest.
Even in sleep, he found her. His arm came up automatically, looping around her waist, hand settling at her hip like it had always belonged there. She tilted her head and pressed a soft kiss to his mouth.
Brock's brow furrowed; a faint, sleepy noise escaped him. One eye cracked open, hazy and unfocused.
"Are you eating peanut butter?"