(Isobel's Point Of View)
I woke to sunlight streaming through unfamiliar windows.
For a moment, I didn't remember where I was. Then I felt the arm wrapped around my waist, the warm weight pressed to my back, and everything rushed back in — the confrontation, the sex, the ache that had been there for months.
The name slid into my head like a stone in a still pool: Etienne…or Alexander?
God, I still didn't know what to call him.
I turned carefully, trying not to wake him. In sleep his face was softer, more open—young in a way that blurred the edges of the man I thought I knew. I traced the plane of his cheek with my eyes, the shadow of stubble at his jaw, the way the morning light caught a tiny scar near his temple.
His eyes opened. "Hi."
"Hi."
"How long have you been awake?"
"Not long." I touched his face tentatively. "I was just... looking at you."
"And?"
"And I'm trying to reconcile the man I see with the man I knew."
