QueenOfSlowBurn

Not a single scrap of ego in sight. No brittle edge of masculinity that so many men wore like armor. Just warmth. Affection. It made you blush and your heart pound, and you had to look away before the butterflies in your chest gave you away.

Amy’s head tilted up from your lap, catching your line of sight. A sly smirk spread across her face.

“If I don’t see a New Year’s kiss at midnight,” she murmured, words syrupy with drink, “I’ll shove you both off the balcony myself.”

You laughed under your breath, trying to bat her off. “Let a girl breathe. I need -"

But Amy didn’t wait for your excuses. She rose fluidly, weaving her way, passing the couch table and crossed legs until she was standing in front of Harry and Kazeem, who were still doubled over with some old university joke.

“I’m beginning to think you’re more in love with him than I am,” Amy teased, eyes on Harry as she slid herself into their circle.

You felt a flush of something that wasn’t quite jealousy, but close - a proud tug like a warm ache. Love. You hadn’t heard Amy sound like that in a long time.

Harry threw up his hands in mock surrender. “Guilty,” he said, grin crooked. “But don’t forget, I’ve seen him naked more times than you can count.”

Kazeem barked out a laugh that filled the room, pulling Amy into his lap with ease. Harry let himself be nudged out of the way, still chuckling as he stumbled lightly back toward the sofa.

And then he was beside you.

He dropped into the seat with a careless grace, a beer bottle dangling from one hand. His other arm lifted, spreading casually across the back of the sofa. He wasn’t touching you - he wasn’t even trying to - but the space he filled, the warmth he radiated, the faint graze of his fingers against the bare skin of your arm as he adjusted… it was enough to make your pulse race.

You told yourself not to lean back. You did anyway, almost unconsciously, your shoulder brushing the crook of his elbow.

Across from you, Amy and Kazeem were already tangled together, their kiss unashamed, long and hungry.

“They’re a sight, aren’t they?” Harry’s voice was low, amusement threading through it, and the vibration of it ran straight down your spine.

“They’ll probably make the most disgustingly beautiful babies alive,” you said before thinking.

His laugh came soft, a sound you felt in your chest. You turned your head to meet his gaze. His eyes, behind the glass, were dark and impossibly warm. Abd he didn’t look away.

And then his fingers brushed your skin again - this time deliberate.

Your breath caught. To shield your sudden spike in pulse you tipped your glass toward him with a crooked smile, voice teasing to mask the thundering in your ribs. “Careful. Someone might think you’re making a move on me.”

The alcohol loosened your tongue, made you bold. But you didn't care. Not tonight.

He leaned closer, grin tugging his mouth. “Just making sure I’m not left alone at midnight.”

You snorted, heat rising to your cheeks. “Wow. Someone’s confident. What makes you so sure you’ll get a New Year’s kiss?”

His reply came as a whisper against your ear, intimate enough to scatter goosebumps down your arms. “Wasn’t talking just about a kiss.”

Your breath stuttered and you open your mouth to reply, but before you could, Amy shrieked from across the room.

“Two minutes to midnight! Everyone out on the terrace!”

The living room erupted. Chairs scraped, coats were grabbed, champagne flutes refilled in haste as people spilled toward the wide glass doors of the balcony. You rose too, slipping away toward the bedroom where Kazeem had stashed your coat earlier.

The pile on the bed was chaos - wool and leather and fur thrown together - but your jacket was nowhere to be found. You cursed softly under your breath, considering just braving the terrace without it.

When you turned, he was there.

Harry leaned against the doorframe, half-shadowed by the dim light, the glow from the terrace spilling faintly around him. Outside, the countdown had already begun, muffled but insistent, voices chanting in unison.

“Ten…”

He pushed off the frame and stepped toward you.

“Nine…”

You let the jacket you just held slip from your hands and straightened your spine. “So this is your grand move?” you murmured, unable to stop the smile tugging your lips.

“Eight…”

“Depends,” he said, closing the space with unhurried confidence. “Is it working?”

“Seven…”

Another step. The room seemed to shrink around you.

“Six…”

You crossed your arms, the smirk barely disguising the tremor in your body. “Only one way to find out.”

“Five…”

Now he was in front of you, so close you could see the flecks of hazel behind the glass of his frames.

“Four…”

His hand rose gently, fingers grazing the line of your jaw before tipping your chin upward.

“Three…”

Your lips parted without your meaning to, breath catching, waiting.

“Two…”

The terrace roared:

“One! Happy New Year!” the crowd bellowed, cheers rising like fireworks.

But you barely heared them.

Because Harry was kissing you.

Softly at first - so soft you thought you might had imagined it. A brush of lips, tentative, reverent, as though he was giving you the chance to pull away.

You didn’t.

You surged instead, hand fisting in the front of his sweater, pulling him down to you. And just as the fireworks cracked over the skyline, the kiss deepened. He tasted of beer, of warmth, of him - everything you wanted, everything you hadn’t let yourself admit you needed until this very second.

Outside, the city thundered with color and sound, champagne glasses clinking, voices shouting greetings to the new year.

Inside, in the shadowed quiet of the bedroom, you pressed yourself against Harry, kissing him like nothing else mattered. Not London. Not the new job. Not the impossible tangle of what-ifs.

Just this. Just him.

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“I’m serious,” Max insisted with complete sincerity. “The guy chipped both his fangs in a motorcycle accident outside Vegas. Completely ruined his life.”

You looked at him in disbelief. “You’re telling me there’s a vampire out there surviving exclusively on stolen blood bags because he face-planted off a Harley?”

“He didn’t face-plant,” Max corrected immediately. “He got hit with a folding chair during a bar fight with motorcyclists.”

“That somehow makes it more pathetic.” You laughed again, louder this time, the sound carrying out across the water while dawn slowly crept over the horizon behind you. Max watched you with an expression you pretended not to notice, something softer than amusement lingering in his tired features.

“There are actual people who need those donations, you know,” you said, trying and failing to sound scandalized through your grin.

“So does he,” Max shot back defensively. “Poor bastard couldn’t even bite into an apple anymore. Had to drink everything through straws since then.”

You shook your head, still smiling as you blinked against the changing sky overhead. You hadn’t even realized how much time had passed until now. The blackness of night had begun dissolving into muted shades of violet and gray, the first pale traces of dawn slowly bleeding into the edges of the world.

For a moment you simply stared at it.

The sunrise.

Or at least the beginning of one.

A strange sadness settled in your chest at the realization that this might become the last one you would ever comfortably witness.

Beside you, Max hissed quietly under his breath.

“This,” he muttered, squinting toward the brightening horizon, “is about to become a problem.”

Your head snapped toward him immediately, genuine alarm flashing across your face. “Hey, you specifically told me sunlight doesn’t kill us.”

“It doesn’t,” he assured you quickly. “But there’s a difference between surviving daylight and enjoying it.”

You remembered then. Every forced daytime meeting you’d had before all of this. The sunglasses. The headaches. The irritation hidden beneath his sarcasm whenever sunlight got too harsh.

“You’re feeling fit enough to move?” you asked, your gaze instinctively flicking over the places Torres had shot him.

Max stretched slightly with an exaggerated groan. “Depends.”

“On?”

“How committed are you to carrying me all the way back to Brooklyn?”

You snorted immediately as you pushed yourself upright, still refusing to let go of his hand and therefore forcing him to rise with you. “Absolutely zero chance.”

“Cruel woman.”

“Get moving, grandpa. Before you burst into flames dramatically.”

He grumbled something under his breath about disrespecting elders while you brushed dirt and loose gravel from your clothes.

You had already turned toward the path leading back through the field when Max’s hand suddenly tightened around your wrist, gentle but enough to stop you.

You turned back toward him instinctively, caught off guard by the sudden closeness as he stepped nearer.

For one suspended moment, uncertainty curled low in your stomach.

Because you knew what that look could mean.

And you weren’t entirely sure yet where your boundaries with him existed now. You had allowed closeness tonight, yes. Allowed comfort. Allowed him beside you despite everything. But a kiss felt different somehow.

Your gaze flicked briefly to his mouth before returning to his eyes.

Max, however, only studied your face for a second before reaching up to brush strands of hair away from your cheek, his finger dragging lightly through one of the dried streaks still staining your skin.

“I think,” he murmured softly, “we should probably wash some of the blood off our faces before rejoining civilization.”

You stared at him for a second longer than necessary.

Max wasn’t entirely sure what to make of the expression on your face.

And suddenly you had a clear answer on what you wanted him to do.

There had been something soft in your eyes for a second too long, something that made him painfully aware of how close you stood. Rather than testing whatever fragile line existed between you though, he simply guided you down toward the water instead, both of you crouching near the edge to wash the remaining blood from your skin as best you could.

The harbor water was freezing against his fingers.

You hissed under your breath the second another streak of pale morning light spread over the horizon. “Jesus Christ,” you muttered, shielding your eyes as you straightened again. “Why is it already so bright?”

Max glanced upward with an expression that mirrored your annoyance. Dawn had barely begun, the sky still painted mostly in deep blues and bruised purples, but already it felt offensively sharp against heightened senses.

“There goes my dream vacation to the Maldives,” you groaned.

Max let out a dry chuckle while rubbing at one eye. “Yeah, tropical islands are probably off the table now. On the upside, I hear Scandinavia is beautiful six months out of the year.”

You barely seemed to hear him. You squinted around the waterfront like someone developing the world’s worst migraine, jaw tightening more with every passing second.

Max was just about to suggest you start heading home before the sunlight got worse when you suddenly turned on your heel and started marching back up the slope toward the trail.

“Ashley - hey.” He stumbled after you instinctively.

You lifted one hand without even looking back, stopping him immediately. “Stay here. I’ll be back in a minute.”

And somehow, absurdly, that was enough.

Max watched you disappear over the rise and felt absolutely no fear that you wouldn’t return.

A few hours ago he would have. A few hours ago he would have expected you to vanish into the city and never look back. But now?

Now you had sat beside him through the entire night. You had held his hand. Saved his life. Laughed with him under the stars.

So he stayed where he was.

The shoreline had become almost peaceful in the growing dawn, the dark water shifting in slow silver ripples beneath the pale sky. Max tipped his head back and took a long unnecessary breath, eyes closing briefly against the cold breeze rolling in from the bay.

Never in thirty years of undeath could he have imagined a night ending like this.

Not after Torres. Not after your death. Not after the look you had given him when you walked out of his apartment hours ago, furious and shattered and certain he had destroyed your life.

And yet somehow you had ended up here instead.

He was still trying to process that impossible fact when movement caught his eye again.

You came jogging back down the hill toward him, slightly out of breath now, a wide grin spreading across your face. Something dangled from one hand as you closed the distance between you.

Max blinked once before barking out a laugh.

“Oh no.”

You held them up triumphantly: two of the ugliest pairs of sunglasses he had ever seen in his entire existence. One pair looked aggressively neon. The other resembled something a retired marathon runner would wear during a midlife crisis.

“They absolutely will not be joining my collection,” Max informed you solemnly while taking the less horrifying pair.

“They better,” you shot back, still breathless. “Do you have any idea how hard it is convincing random joggers to hand over their sunglasses to a woman covered in blood?”

Max slid the glasses onto his face and immediately winced at the design. “You forgot to mention the Halloween pajama pants. That probably complicated negotiations.”

You looked down at yourself before glaring at him over the oversized frames now perched on your nose. “I’m sorry, are you giving me fashion advice while dressed like a divorcee from 1995?”

Max grinned despite himself.

The city had always known how to look away from people who appeared a little broken around the edges. In a place like New York, bloodstains, exhaustion and strange behavior barely ranked high enough to earn more than a passing glance, especially not in the gray-blue hour between night and morning when the first commuters drifted through the streets half awake and wrapped tightly in their own lives.

And as the first real sunlight finally began breaking over the horizon behind you, while that reluctant smile still lingered on your mouth, he realized with painful clarity that he wanted nothing more than to kiss you again.

A few people looked twice as you and Max emerged from Church Avenue station, but nobody stopped you. Nobody asked questions. A woman in scrubs hurried past with coffee in hand. A delivery driver cursed at his phone. Somewhere farther down the block, metal shutters rattled open for the beginning of another ordinary day.

Beside you, Max adjusted the atrocious sunglasses perched on his nose and glanced over with the faintest trace of amusement. “Wish I’d brought my camera,” he said with a grin. “This whole look we’ve got going on deserves documentation.”

You peered at him over the rim of your borrowed glasses and instantly regretted it as the early dawn stabbed into your eyes like needles.

Even sitting across from him in the nearly empty subway car earlier had felt surreal enough to burn itself permanently into your memory. You had occupied opposite benches in silence for stretches at a time, the train rattling beneath you while fluorescent lights flickered overhead. Max had lounged back, arms stretched casually across the backs of the seats, ankle resting atop one knee with effortless confidence that should have looked ridiculous considering the state he was in.

“Trust me,” you muttered, squinting hard. “I don’t think I’ll ever forget this night even without photos.”

Instead, it had only made him look more himself.

His curls were stiff with dried blood. The fabric of his shirt had been torn open where the bullets had hit him, stained brown-red and ruined beyond saving. There were shadows beneath his eyes that no healing could erase immediately, and yet he had still carried himself with that same infuriating ease, studying advertisements above the windows as if he hadn’t nearly died only hours ago.

You had caught yourself staring longer than intended.

“Definitely top five most memorable nights,” Max pulled you from your thoughts.

You snorted softly while you crossed the quiet street toward your building. “Only top five?” you asked, walking backward for a few steps just to keep looking at him. “Wow. I’m offended.”

“What can I say?” Max lifted one shoulder. “LA was a deeply irresponsible place.”

“Before or after the vampire thing?”

“Both.”

You reached the front entrance first and leaned against the wall beside it while Max stepped close enough for the scent of him to wrap around you again, warm despite the cold morning air. He pulled his keys free, caging you loosely between himself and the door without seeming fully aware he was doing it. Or maybe entirely aware.

At this distance you could see the tiny cuts already healed across his face, the faint exhaustion still lingering around his mouth, the way dawn light softened the sharper edges of him. Your gaze dipped briefly to his lips before you could stop yourself.

“Need to hear your top five now, obviously,” you said, and hated how breathless your voice sounded.

The lock clicked open beneath his hand.

“Oh, easy.” His grin deepened as he nudged the door inward. “Fifth place definitely goes to a house party in 1978 where somebody accidentally set an indoor fountain on fire.”

You blinked. “You can’t set water on fire.”

“That was also my understanding at the time,” Max replied solemnly as you stepped into the dim stairwell. “Turns out cocaine and homemade electrical wiring can achieve incredible things.”

A laugh escaped you before you could stop it, echoing softly up the stairs.

Max glanced back over his shoulder, satisfaction flickering briefly across his face before he continued upward beside you. “Anyway, by two in the morning somebody had stolen a police horse, there was a drummer passed out in a bathtub full of oranges, and I distinctly remember escaping through a window because the host’s girlfriend tried to stab me with a fondue fork.”

You stared at him in disbelief. “That sounds made up.”

“It absolutely does,” he agreed. “Which is why it only made fifth place.”

“What’s fourth place?” you asked as you climbed the stairs, nearly missing a step because you were too busy watching him instead of where you put your feet. Your hand caught the railing at the last second, and Max glanced back with immediate amusement.

“My turning, probably,” he answered after a moment of thought. “I don’t remember much of the actual event, but there was definitely a party involved. Feels wrong not to rank it somewhere.”

You hummed softly. The answer settled strangely inside your chest. The wound of your own turning still felt too fresh - too raw to touch directly - but you supposed he was right. Whether you liked it or not, that night would probably carve itself permanently into the architecture of your existence too.

“Fair enough,” you said quietly before forcing a lighter tone back into your voice. “Alright, then what’s third? And please tell me it involves less dying.”

Max laughed under his breath as you reached your floor. “No dying. Technically a felony, though.” He paused dramatically while fishing his keys from his pocket. “Me and a couple school friends broke into the zoo when I was maybe eight or nine. We stole a penguin.”

You stared at him. “You what?”

“I have to say he seemed excited to come with us.”

“That poor animal.”

Max opened the apartment door and held it for you with effortless familiarity - and equally naturally you stepped inside without waiting to be invited.

“I’m telling you,” he continued while closing the door behind you, “I had a solid plan. We had a perfectly functional refrigerator.”

You kicked off your boots near the entrance and snorted softly. “Your mother must’ve loved you.”

“She threatened to send me back to the zoo with him.”

The warmth of the apartment wrapped around you instantly, dim and quiet compared to the cold dawn outside. You removed the hideous sunglasses with visible relief and wandered toward the small brass mirror hanging beside the door. In the softened light you could finally properly see yourself again: dried blood still shadowed the edge of your jaw despite your attempt to clean up by the water, your hair an unruly mess around tired golden eyes that no longer quite looked human.

Behind you, Max slipped off his coat, draping it over the back of a chair. His reflection appeared in the mirror a second later, close enough that you could feel his presence before he even spoke.

“So,” you murmured while rubbing at the stubborn stain on your skin, “tonight only gets second place?”

“It was a strong contender,” he admitted easily.

You looked at him through the mirror. “And first?”

For a second he simply watched you. Then his mouth curved slowly into that infuriatingly smug grin you already knew far too well.

“I assumed that one was obvious.”

You turned fully toward him, brows lifting in confusion as he stepped closer. The distance between you dissolved with dangerous ease until he stood directly in front of you again.

“You played a pretty significant role in it,” he said softly.

Realization hit you all at once, and a breathless laugh escaped before you could stop it. “Wow. That memorable, huh?”

“Life-changing, honestly.”

His hand lifted to cup your jaw, thumb brushing softly across clean skin this time instead of blood. The touch sent warmth unfurling low in your stomach so fast it almost startled you.

“Maybe my memory needs refreshing though,” he added, voice lower now, teasing threaded through the exhaustion.

Your pulse no longer existed, but your body still found ways to betray anticipation. “Remind me,” you whispered, “are there any more rules I should know about?”

Max leaned down slowly, lips ghosting against your cheek without quite kissing you, and goosebumps erupted along your arms instantly. He lingered there for a moment before stopping just shy of your mouth, his gaze fixed steadily on yours.

“Only one,” he murmured. “I’ve had enough blood for one night.”

His fingers slid gently through your tangled hair before he offered you the faintest smile.

“So first,” he said softly, “we clean up.”

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Merry Christmas, Harry.

That means a lot. It really does. Thank you.

Savor the days with your family. Having a loving home to come back to is a precious thing.

Tell London to welcome me with open arms, as New York did for you!

Emily.

Simple. Courteous. Warm without being open, polite without being cold. And yet… it could mean everything.

He had spent nearly two hours composing his own Christmas message, hunched in front of the fireplace in the early hours of the morning.

Drafting, deleting, rewriting - careful not to cross the line into confessions he couldn’t afford.

He had let himself remember then, in the dark, the weight of your laughter against his skin, the way your body had felt wrapped in his arms. He’d carried that memory like a talisman while trying to find words you could accept.

And you had answered. Not indifferently. Not with silence.

Still, it wasn’t clarity.

Harry exhaled through his nose. Enough. He couldn’t spiral into interpretation again. If the evening allowed it, he would speak to you. If you let him.

He went to his closet and chose simplicity: a soft cable-knit pullover, dark jeans, sneakers. No need for spectacle. He smoothed the fabric down his chest, checking the fit in the mirror.

Kazeem had promised the night was casual, a mix of colleagues, friends, and neighbors drifting in and out. Thirty people, give or take. Thirty distractions he couldn’t care less about.

Because all he really hoped - Christ - was that you would show.

He crossed to the bathroom, uncapped his cologne, dabbed it across his neck and wrists with practiced restraint. Reached for his contact lenses, then hesitated, the small case poised in his hand.

For a long moment, he stood there, staring at his own reflection. Tired lines softened now by rest, hair a little more undone than usually in the office, natural curls escaping, beard ruff but tidied enough. His eyes, sharper without the glasses, clinical. The image of the man he presented to the world.

Then, in one swift motion, he put the contacts back on the shelf and reached for his dark-rimmed glasses instead.

There was something in the honesty of it that felt necessary tonight. If he was going to face you, it would not be behind a performance, not shielded by surfaces.

Coat over his arm, keys in his pocket, he cast a last look around the apartment - still, ordered, waiting for his return. Then he stepped out into the hall, heart thrumming, carrying with him both dread and anticipation in equal measure.

Kazeem’s door swung open, and suddenly there was warmth spilling out, laughter, the clink of glasses.

“Mate,” Kazeem said, pulling him in with a grin, a bear hug that knocked the last bit of cold from his shoulders. Harry returned it, brief but firm, breathing in the familiar cologne of his friend, grounding himself in the easy welcome.

Kazeem looked much the same as ever - thick dark curls pushed back, a full beard framing his expressive face, eyes deep and bright with mischief. He wore casual black slacks and a loose shirt rolled at the sleeves, somehow managing that effortless balance between sharp and comfortable.

The party was already alive around them - voices overlapping, music weaving through conversations, someone’s laugh bright and sudden in the next room. Kazeem’s apartment was exactly what he’d expected: a New York industrial dream.

Red brick walls catching the golden wash of dimmed lighting, steel fixtures softened by plants, books stacked between leather chairs. And the terrace - he caught a glimpse as someone stepped outside, the night sky and city lights beyond promising fireworks later. It was stylish, yes, but also warm. Like Kazeem himself, a blend of intention and comfort.

“Get yourself a drink,” Kazeem said, reaching for his coat. “Be with you in a bit.”

Before Harry could answer, another figure appeared from behind his friend. Amy.

Radiant as he remembered. Her hair a halo of untamed curls, her outfit bold - colorful bell-bottoms, paired with a fitted top that seemed to catch every flicker of light. She beamed, stepped right into his space as if they had known each other for years, and folded him into a hug.

“Harry Castillo in the flesh,” she said against his shoulder, then leaned back, her eyes glittering. “Welcome.”

He found himself smiling despite the tension knotted low in his stomach. “Good to see you again.”

Amy tilted her head knowingly, her mouth quirking before she winked. “I’ll let you know when she arrives.”

The words hit like a shot to the chest. Fuck, was it that obvious? Did Amy know what he had done - how he’d failed you, how he’d hidden - and was this friendliness only a veneer stretched over disapproval?

He swallowed, managed a small nod. “Thank you,” he murmured, the words carrying more weight than they should. Thank you for the warning. Thank you for the invitation. Thank you for not looking at me with anger.

He reached for a drink as he slipped his socialite mask into place. He could do this. The room was full, not intimate - perfect cover for easing into conversation.

And he did, letting himself be pulled into easy chatter with two of Kazeem’s colleagues, then teasing his host about the spread on the buffet table. His laugh came easier than expected, a shield polished by years of practice.

But then - 

A shriek. Amy’s voice, cutting through the layered hum of the party.

His gaze shifted instinctively.

And there you were.

Your coat already half off, scarf slipping into your hand, hair twisted into a messy updo that wasn’t careless at all - no, it was deliberate, a few loose strands framing your face, catching the golden light. You were smiling, lips painted a dark red that pulled every part of you into focus, parted as you laughed into Amy’s embrace.

You looked… not just beautiful. Stunning.

Harry froze. Breath held, glass hovering halfway to his mouth. He couldn’t have looked away if he tried.

You kissed Amy’s cheek, spoke something too low for him to hear, then turned to Kazeem with the same familiarity, hugging him warmly, your laughter bright enough to rise above the music. You belonged here, your presence weaving into the room as naturally as if you had been part of this circle forever.

And suddenly, painfully, he was aware of his own distance.

Your outfit struck him next - timeless, understated but striking. Black slip on dress, high collar, sleeveless, hugging your form in just the right places without being loud. No sequins, no flash. You didn’t need it. The red of your mouth was enough. Your smile was enough.

God, you were everything.

Harry tipped his drink back, the burn of alcohol chasing down the ache in his throat. He considered moving - walking over, offering a greeting, anything to bridge the distance - but his feet stayed rooted. Not yet. He couldn’t crash this reunion, couldn’t interrupt the joy on your face as you rejoined your people, your chosen family.

So he stayed where he was, leaning casually against the drink buffet, the practiced mask of indifference set back into place. His eyes, though - they betrayed him, tracing your movements across the room as you laughed with Amy, touched Kazeem’s arm, shed the last traces of winter from your shoulders.

The room swelled around him with music, voices, clinking glasses. But for Harry, the night had narrowed to this - waiting, watching, wondering if fate or chance or sheer courage would hand him a moment with you before midnight.

For once, he let go of the reins.

You spotted him the second he looked away.

He had been scanning the room from the buffet, glass in hand, that subtle way he always measured his surroundings, but then his gaze shifted and he stepped into a cluster of strangers like it was nothing. Sliding into conversation, easy, polished, so terribly Harry. You hated how your stomach dropped, how that warm, familiar pull snapped to life in your chest.

And damn - he looked so comfortable. A cream cable-knit sweater that softened him, well-worn jeans, sneakers that made him seem younger. And then the glasses. Dark-rimmed, devastatingly familiar. They made him look almost… cozy. Home. As if this was where he belonged, exactly here, and you hated how much you wanted to believe that included you.

“Have you forgiven him yet?”

Amy’s voice cut through your thoughts. A drink appeared in your hand, courtesy of your best friend, who was still watching Harry with narrowed eyes.

You startled, heat rising in your face. “I -”

“Or,” Amy added sweetly, “time for a little hate fuck?”

That snapped your head around. You silenced Amy with a look sharp enough to kill.

Amy only grinned, unbothered.

“It’s not about that,” you said finally, taking a long swallow of whatever was in your glass. You weren’t sure you believed your own words. What was it about? Forgiveness? Pride? Timing? All of it seemed tangled, messy.

It wasn’t smart, any of it.

Not with London weeks away. Not with your entire life about to reset across the Atlantic. You would be colleagues soon enough - equals, not boss and employee. You should want clean lines. You should want distance.

Should.

You took another sip, steadying yourself for the lecture Amy would deliver next, but when you turned, Harry turned too. Your eyes met across the room, and everything inside you stopped. The words you’d meant to throw back at Amy dissolved.

Next to you, Amy chuckled low. “Yeah,” she purred. “You two definitely need to fuck that one out.” Then she pressed a kiss to your cheek, a pat to your shoulder, and slipped back into the fold of her people - into Kazeem’s waiting arm, which wrapped around her like she belonged there and nowhere else.

Harry’s gaze didn’t waver. It was steady, a quiet invitation, unspoken but clear as glass: I’m ready. Whenever you are.

Hell. Better late than never, isn’t it?

You drained another sip for courage and stepped toward him, heels sinking slightly into the rug as you approached the buffet. Your voice betrayed you, softer than you intended, shy in a way you loathed. “Hi.”

“Hi,” he answered, and you nearly buckled at the sound. His tone was gentle - softer than you had ever heard it.

For a breath you stood suspended, music and laughter spilling around you, until you both opened your mouths at once. Words collided, tangled, and you both laughed awkwardly. You waved him on, gesturing for him to go first.

“How are preparations for London?” he asked, earnest beneath the casual words.

Alright, we dive right in, do we?

“Fine. Horrible.” You let out a laugh, shaking your head. “It’s a lot. Too much for so little time. I can’t quite believe I’ll be on a one-way flight in two weeks.”

He tilted his head, studying you. “Have you figured out what you’ll do with your place?”

You leaned back against the edge of the table, pretending his presence didn’t unravel you thread by thread. “Keep it for now. A wise man once told me it’s always smart to hold on to good property.” You shot him a wink, watching the tight line of his shoulders ease just slightly.

“Wise men,” he said, attempting a smile that carried weight beneath it, “aren’t always right.”

“Most men aren’t,” you replied dryly, lips curving. “But at least wise ones know when they’ve done wrong.”

The quip landed between you, sharp but not cruel, and for a moment his mask slipped. Harry set his drink down, closing the space just slightly, his height and warmth suddenly nearer.

“Emily.” The sound of your name from his lips was enough to scatter butterflies low in your stomach. “I am truly… truly sorry.”

Your smile faltered into something smaller, tired but honest. “I know. I wouldn’t be here otherwise.”

Around you, the party hummed - a swell of music, bursts of laughter, glasses clinking, a whoop from the terrace as early fireworks popped in the distance. The noise felt like a cocoon, wrapping you both, offering cover for words too heavy to say in daylight.

“My offer still stands,” Harry said, his voice quieter now. “Whatever you need - finding a place, arranging the move, the firm. I’ll help. Just say when.”

You swirled the last of your drink, deliberately slow, as though weighing your answer. You already knew, of course. You could not quite push him away. Not entirely.

“When,” you said at last, letting the single word hang between you. Then you set your empty glass down with a decisive clink. “But first…” You straightened, lifting your chin. “Let’s enjoy this party, okay?”

A flicker of relief passed through his face, subtle but there. He nodded, a ghost of a smile tugging his mouth.

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Your lashes rested low against your cheeks, expression softened into almost peaceful surrender as you drank. The violence existed only in the reality of what you were doing. In every other sense, you looked transcendent.

Max thought he had forgotten what awe felt like.

Apparently not.

Even with agony tearing through his side, even while blood soaked steadily through his fingers where he pressed uselessly against the gunshot wound, he could not drag his eyes away from you.

The moonlight spilling through the shattered windows overhead mixed with the red downpour until the entire gymnasium seemed suspended somewhere between dream and nightmare.

And at the center of it was you.

Beautiful enough to ruin him completely.

The realization settled heavily into his chest as his strength continued slipping away from him in slow, steady waves. Every movement hurt now. Every breath scraped through him hollow and wrong.

Torres’ traps had already left his senses battered and overloaded long before the bullets hit him, and now the blood loss dragged relentlessly at what little stability remained.

He somehow knew the feeling, inexplicably knew exactly what it meant.

The darkness gathering at the corners of his vision was no longer temporary.

Strangely, he found he did not fear it.

Not really.

Because despite everything, despite the betrayal in your eyes when you had walked out of his apartment, despite the certainty that whatever existed between you had shattered beyond repair… you were alive. Somehow.

Alive and strong and magnificent.

The devotion swelling painfully inside him nearly eclipsed the physical agony.

Because he knew in the same terrible instant that he had both saved you and lost you forever.

Max let his head tip weakly back against the soaked floor, his unfocused gaze still fixed on your shape across the room while his body gradually surrendered to exhaustion. Your name slipped from his lips almost soundlessly, carried more by feeling than breath.

“Ashley…”

The sound cut through the haze enveloping you instantly.

The bliss vanished.

One final swallow slid down your throat as Torres’ pulse stuttered and disappeared beneath your lips completely. His body slackened under your hands, emptied in every possible sense, and suddenly the intoxicating flood filling your system fractured apart beneath the quiet rasp of your own name.

You lifted your head sharply.

Blood stained your mouth, dark against your skin. Your pupils widened as you looked across the gym and saw Max curled against the floor several feet away, one arm stretched weakly toward you while the rest of him remained frighteningly still.

For one horrible second, he looked dead.

Ice flooded straight through you.

You were at Max’s side instantly, dropping hard to your knees and pulling him upright into your lap. His body felt heavy, lacking the impossible strength that had always seemed inseparable from him.

“Max?”

Your voice cracked harder than you intended. One hand slid against his cheek while the other steadied his head against your shoulder.

“Hey,” you snapped, panic sharpening the edges of your tone. “No. No, don’t do that.”

His eyes stayed shut.

You slapped his cheek lightly once, then again, fear rising fast enough to make your chest ache.

“Wake up.”

At last his eyelids fluttered weakly open.

Relief hit you so violently it almost made you dizzy.

“Don’t you dare pull this on me,” you hissed immediately, anger rushing in to cover the terror beneath it as you shifted him higher against you. “You don’t get to die before we have this conversation.”

A weak cough tore through him, followed by something that almost resembled a laugh.

“Honestly,” Max murmured hoarsely, “not convinced I’d survive that conversation anyway.”

You let out a breathless, bitter scoff.

“Yeah,” you muttered. “Me neither.”

Carefully, you slipped both arms beneath his and forced you both upright with unbalanced effort. Even with your new strength, stabilizing him proved awkward; Max half-collapsed against you immediately, one arm draped heavily across your shoulders while you adjusted to the unfamiliar balance of supporting someone who usually felt untouchable.

“But if anyone gets to kill you,” you said tightly as you staggered forward together, “it’s going to be me.” Your eyes flicked briefly toward Torres’ body lying motionless beneath the bloody rain. “Not him.”

An exhausted silence settled between you.

You guided the two of you slowly across the ruined gym floor while Max limped beside you, weaker with every step. The adrenaline that had carried you through the fight still thundered through your veins, making you feel almost invincible now, but beneath it all another emotion pressed harder against your ribs.

Grief.

Not for what you had done.

For who you had done it to.

“Are you okay?” Max’s voice had lost the humor entirely this time.

You shot him a look of disbelief. “You have at least two gunshot wounds,” you said flatly. “And you’re asking me that?”

But you understood immediately what he actually meant.

You passed Torres’s body and felt yourself swallow instinctively as your gaze caught on the stillness of him. Blood continued pooling slowly beneath his neck, diluted by the red rainwater flooding the floor.

Max watched you quietly.

“He deserved it,” you said at last, the words coming cold.

“Maybe,” Max answered softly. “Doesn’t mean it can’t hurt anyway.”

You stared ahead for a long moment.

Then finally you gave a small nod.

“No,” you admitted. “But it sure as hell makes it easier.”

Your grip tightened slightly around him before you forced yourself to look away from the corpse entirely.

“Come on,” you muttered. “Let’s get out of this godforsaken shithole.”

Max was not particularly light, but carrying him through the dark expanse of Floyd Bennett Field proved far less difficult than you would once have imagined. The fresh blood still humming through your system flooded your limbs with unnatural strength and relentless energy, smoothing over exhaustion before it could fully settle in.

The farther you moved from the building, the quieter the world became.

The old airfield stretched endlessly around you beneath the moonlight, all vast open paths and shadowed grasslands interrupted by skeletal remains of structures long abandoned to time.

Somewhere far in the distance, Brooklyn still existed - all its noise and movement and sleepless life somewhere beyond, but here at the edge of the borough, wrapped by dark water on nearly every side, the city felt impossibly far away.

Only the wind remained.

It swept softly through the empty recreational trails and rattled the tall grass lining the paths where joggers and dog walkers would return once morning arrived. For now, though, the darkness belonged solely to you both.

After everything that had happened inside the gymnasium, the silence felt surreal.

Peaceful, even.

You kept moving until the trail opened toward the waterfront. At last your legs gave out beneath the delayed strain of adrenaline and emotion, and you lowered both of you carefully onto the rocky shoreline near the water’s edge. Max exhaled sharply the second he sat down - pain pulling tight across his features despite the weak attempt he made to hide it.

The bay stretched out endlessly before you, black water rippling beneath fractured moonlight. Across the distance, faint lights shimmered along the far shoreline like scattered stars fallen onto earth.

The water lapped quietly against the shore only feet away, steady and rhythmic enough to almost resemble breathing.

But you had no eye for the eerie beauty of this nightly scenery. Your eyes were scanning Max.

“Show me.” The words came more as an order than a request, your hands already moving toward the blood soaking through his shirt.

Max managed the faintest crooked grin. “Wow,” he muttered weakly, “at least buy me dinner first.”

You shot him a glare so sharp it could have cut glass. “You want that engraved on your tombstone?” you asked flatly. “Because I can arrange it.”

His smile lingered despite the exhaustion dragging at him from every angle, but he obeyed. With your help, he peeled the ruined fabric away from his torso, revealing the wounds beneath.

Your expression tightened instantly.

The gunshots looked catastrophic.

One had torn through his side, jagged and blackened around the edges where whatever Torres had used had clearly done more damage than ordinary bullets ever could. The second sat frighteningly close to the center of his chest, blood still seeping sluggishly from the wound despite the healing already fighting to close it.

A human would have died instantly.

Max merely looked like he stood at death’s doorway arguing with it out of spite.

You swallowed hard.

“What do I do?” Your eyes snapped up to his. “Tell me how to fix this.”

Max leaned his head back slightly, exhaustion hollowing out the sharp lines of his face. In the moonlight, his skin looked almost translucent beneath the streaks of drying blood.

“I’d suggest praying,” he murmured. “Though God may be the wrong address.”

“There has to be something.” Frustration crept into your voice. “You said we heal.”

We.

The word slipped out before you could stop it and you felt it land between you immediately. Max noticed too. You saw it in the faint shift of his expression, something softer flickering briefly through the pain.

Still, he only sighed.

“Believe it or not,” he said, “this is my first time dying too.”

The attempt at humor barely masked the weakness in his voice.

Without thinking, you shifted closer when he sagged against you slightly.

You allowed the contact - his weight leaning into your side and the familiar scent of him wrapping around you despite everything that had happened between you.

The anger remained somewhere inside you. But right now, fear sat heavier.

Your gaze drifted toward the dark shoreline around you before an idea surfaced suddenly and violently enough to make you straighten.

“What if you feed?”

Max blinked slowly away from the empty waterfront, overlooking your surroundings.

“Unless I missed a very determined jogger,” he muttered, “I don’t see many options.”

You hesitated only briefly.

“You fed me,” you said carefully, your eyes returning to his. “Didn’t you?”

You did not know how you knew it with such certainty. The memory itself remained fractured and blurred by death and transformation, but something deeper inside you understood the truth instinctively.

Max’s expression shifted.

“Ashley -”

“So maybe…” Your non-existent pulse quickened despite itself. “Maybe it works both ways.”

He gathered enough strength to straighten slightly, one hand pressing harder against his wounded side.

“No.” His brows drew together immediately. “I’m not asking you for that.”

“You’re not asking.” Your voice sharpened. “I’m offering.”

The wind stirred your damp hair across your face as you looked back out toward the water briefly, gathering yourself before meeting his eyes again.

“Please,” you said more quietly now. “I really don’t want two deaths on my conscience tonight.”

For a moment he only stared at you.

Then finally - reluctantly - Max gave the smallest nod.

You moved closer until barely any space remained between you. You could feel the warmth radiating from him despite the blood loss, could smell him beneath the copper and salt and cold ocean air. Weakened or not, his presence still pulled at you with terrifying ease.

Holding his gaze, you lifted your wrist slowly toward your mouth.

Max’s free hand rose instinctively, brushing a damp strand of hair away from your face before settling softly against your cheek.

Pain bloomed briefly as your teeth pierced flesh, followed almost immediately by the metallic taste of your own blood spilling warm against your tongue.

Then you pressed your wrist carefully to Max’s mouth.

At first his touch was featherlight.

A kiss more than a bite.

Blood stained his lips slowly while he let only the smallest amount pass between you, restraint etched into every movement despite the hunger flickering visibly behind his tired eyes. But after a moment his hand slid from your cheek to the back of your wrist instead, holding you there more firmly as he drank deeper.

The sensation that flooded you nearly stole your breath.

Warmth surged through your body in slow, pulsing waves. You could feel something passing between you beyond blood alone, something deeper and older than language, life itself shifting from one body into another.

And beneath it all came understanding.

This was what he had done for you.

Max had not simply saved you.

He had shared himself with you.

Max’s mouth moved carefully against your wrist while the night wrapped itself around you both, endless and quiet except for the water breaking softly against the shore. Time seemed to stretch strangely there beside the bay, the moment lingering suspended between grief and intimacy until you could no longer tell whether seconds or hours had passed at all.

When Max finally managed to pull himself away from the intoxicating warmth of your blood, it felt less like regaining control and more like dragging himself reluctantly from the edge of something sacred. Strength already pulsed back through his body in steady waves, threading warmth through limbs that moments ago had bordered on useless.

The relentless ache in his chest and side had dulled enough that he could breathe without feeling his body splinter apart with every movement.

His lips slipped from your wrist and before he could stop himself, he pressed the softest kiss against the healing wound.

The skin beneath his mouth had already begun knitting itself back together, smooth and warm under the lingering trace of blood. For a second he allowed himself to remain there, eyes shut, forehead nearly brushing your arm.

Then you carefully pulled your hand back.

“How are you feeling?” you asked in hushed tones.

There was caution in your voice now. Not fear exactly, but awareness. As if you still did not fully understand what existed between you after everything that had happened.

Max noticed the slight distance you created immediately.

And despite the instinct screaming at him to close it, to pull you against him and bury himself in the comfort of your presence after nearly losing you twice, he forced himself not to.

Pushing too hard now would only drive you further away.

So instead he leaned back slightly and offered you the faintest smile, sadness lingering stubbornly beneath it.

“Well,” he murmured, brushing a drop of your blood from the corner of his mouth, “apparently we’ve got miracle medicine running through our veins.”

To his relief, the corner of your mouth twitched upward ever so slightly.

It was small. Brief.

But it existed.

“Give me a minute,” he added softly. “Then we can get the hell out of here.”

You huffed lightly through your nose, drawing your knees closer to your chest. “Bold of you to assume I’m sticking around to wait for you.”

For a second he genuinely could not tell whether you meant it.

Then he caught the faint dryness beneath the words and allowed himself the smallest exhale of relief.

“Wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t,” he replied.

This time the humor faded quicker.

His gaze drifted away from you before he could stop himself. Looking directly into your eyes had become almost unbearable now. Those golden irises still stunned him every time he saw them, not only because they marked what you had become, but because he could still remember exactly how soft they used to look when you watched him before all of this shattered between you.

Now every glance carried distance.

And guilt clawed through him every single time he noticed it.

So instead Max looked out over the dark water stretching endlessly before him while you sat beside him in silence. He could feel the wounds inside him continuing to heal slowly, strengthened by what you had given him. Gratitude sat heavily in his chest alongside the guilt, so immense he barely knew what to do with it.

After what he had done to you, you still chose to save him.

You could have left him bleeding out on that gym floor without hesitation. Hell, after everything, he would have understood it. You had gone there for Torres. For revenge. For answers. You could have easily decided that one dead monster beside another solved all your problems at once.

Instead -

“Thank you, Ashley.” The sincerity in his own voice startled him a little.

There was no grin attached to the words. No sarcasm softening them. No deflection hidden behind charm. Just raw honesty laid bare beneath the open night sky.

He kept his eyes fixed on the water because he could not bear seeing whatever expression crossed your face in response.

“You’re welcome,” you answered after a moment.

Max swallowed once before speaking again, though the words barely made it halfway out.

“I cannot -”

“You know,” you interrupted softly, “it wouldn’t actually have changed anything if you’d killed Torres instead of me.”

The sentence hit him immediately, but he stayed quiet and let you continue.

“I never asked for any of this.” Your voice remained calm, though exhaustion frayed the edges now. “Not to become the target of a serial killer. Not to wake up as…” You gestured vaguely toward yourself before letting your hand fall again. “Whatever the hell I am now.”

At last you turned toward him fully.

“And definitely not to become part of your redemption story.”

The words hurt because they were true. You let out a hollow little laugh, one entirely devoid of humor.

“Funny, isn’t it?” you murmured. “Both of you were so busy trying to save me that neither of you bothered asking what I wanted.”

Max closed his eyes briefly.

Because there it was.

The ugly truth at the center of everything.

Torres had tried to save you by killing you.

Max had tried to save your life by changing it forever.

And somewhere between those choices, you yourself had been stripped of any voice at all.

“You both decided for me,” you continued. “And maybe your intentions were different, but the result still feels pretty damn similar.”

The wind shifted strands of damp hair across your face while you turned back toward the water, resting your chin against your knees. Moonlight silvered the sharp line of your profile, softening your expression despite the ache threaded through every word.

“You both took pieces of me I can’t ever get back.”

Max stared at you for a long moment before lowering his gaze.

“I know,” he said finally.

And he did. Far more now than he had in that apartment while holding your dying body in his arms and convincing himself there had been no choice.

“There’s nothing I can say that fixes it.” His voice roughened slightly. “Nothing that gives you your life back.” He paused carefully before continuing. “But I’ll spend however long you let me, trying to make this easier for you.”

You stayed silent.

Max folded his arms loosely across his knees and forced himself to say the part that hurt most.

“And if you decide you never want to see me again after tonight…” He swallowed hard once. “I’ll understand that too.”

The thought alone hollowed him out.

Because despite everything, despite the guilt and the blood and the violence, he loved you with a depth that terrified him now more than ever before.

And if losing you was the price for saving you -

Then maybe this was simply the punishment he deserved.

“You know what’s funny?” you asked after a beat. “I always hated night shifts. Not because of the sleep schedule, although that part absolutely sucked too.” A small laugh escaped you, real enough to make something tighten painfully in Max’s chest. “But because everything that happened at night always felt worse somehow. Darker. Like the city stopped pretending.”

The wind moved through the tall grass behind you in soft waves, carrying the scent of saltwater and asphalt from the distant city.

You tilted your head back to look at the sky, and Max followed your gaze instinctively. The glow of the city swallowed most of the stars, but farther from Manhattan’s endless glare, a few constellations still managed to survive. Pale pinpricks of light shimmered weakly overhead, scattered across deep black.

“I think I hated nights so much,” you continued after a moment, “that I stopped noticing how beautiful the city looks under the dark sky.”

Max watched you more than the stars. Watched the moonlight catch against the strands of hair still clinging to your neck, the softened lines of your face now that rage and grief weren’t consuming every inch of it.

Slowly, you leaned back onto your elbows, eyes fixed upward as if trying to relearn the world from scratch. Max mirrored you again without thinking, lowering himself carefully beside you despite the lingering ache in his chest.

“That’s what it comes down to, doesn’t it?” you murmured. “Making the best out of it.” Your mouth curved faintly, though the expression never fully became a smile. “As far as I understand it, I’ve got a very long time ahead of me to figure this whole thing out.”

Max let out a quiet breath through his nose. “Took me hell of a lot longer to understand that, really. But yeah, because otherwise, what’s the point, right?”

You glanced sideways at him. “Quite the philosopher wasted on you,” you smirked.

“Maybe I am not at the top of my game at the moment,” he grinned weakly.

“Or maybe,” you countered, turning your head toward him, “you just suck at explaining yourself.”

Max huffed out a faint laugh and let his gaze drift back toward the stars. “That too.”

Silence settled more comfortably between you after that, no longer sharp enough to cut. He wasn’t sure if he could already dare his next words but he tried anyway.

“You know what else sucks?”

You turned your head toward him fully now, one brow lifting in cautious curiosity. Slowly he let one canine drag over his lower lip before flashing you a grin that was just arrogant enough to be familiar.

You stared at him for exactly one second before a completely unfiltered laugh broke free from your chest. You hit his shoulder hard enough to make him wince dramatically.

“Your jokes definitely do.”

“Cruel,” he murmured solemnly.

“Honest.”

But your hand lingered after the shove, resting against his arm for a brief uncertain second before sliding lower. Max went completely still beneath the touch, not daring to move, not wanting to risk breaking whatever fragile thing existed between you right now. Your fingers brushed against his hand once, tentative at first, before threading fully between his.

“So,” you said softly, your thumb brushing once against the back of his hand, “since we’re apparently stuck waiting here while you stop dying… why don’t you give me the full Vampire 101?”

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“Undress.” The word didn’t land. Not at first anyway. It hung in the air between you, too flat, too casual, like you had misheard it - like your mind had twisted something else into something far worse. You just stared at Joel and your vision blurred at the edges, tears gathering without your permission, your chest tightening around a breath that wouldn’t come. “Joel…” It barely made it out, more whisper than anything else. “Don’t ‘Joel’ me, sweetheart.” His voice stayed even, grounded in that same quiet authority that made everything feel final the moment he said it. “You heard me just fine.” A small tilt of his head toward the edge of the bed. “Up. Off. And get out of those clothes.” Your body didn’t move. It wasn’t defiance - not really. There was no strength behind it, or resistance you could follow through on. It was more like a full-body refusal that locked every muscle in place and turned your limbs heavy and unresponsive. You could only look at him. Could only hope - irrationally, desperately - that he would see it. That he would read the fear sitting plain in your eyes and understand what he was asking, what he was doing. That something in him would stop this. It didn’t. A tired breath left Joel instead, the faintest flicker of impatience crossing his face. “Listen, darlin’,” he said, quieter now, but no less firm. “I don’t like repeatin’ myself.” The knife flipped once in his hand with ease - until the blade pointed your way. “So you got about a second,” he continued, almost conversational, “to get down here and start movin’… before I decide to help you along.”

Second WIP is the fourth part for my priest!joel series "Lessons in Sin". Took me a while but finally the epiphany came (and an ask with inspiration). Father Joel has some punishment in mind for you disregarding the 10 commandments:

“You’re nearly done, Darlin’. I promise,” he murmurs, as if reading your mind once more.  You nod quickly, sniffing and pressing your face into the linen to wipe away the hot tears, trying to convince yourself his words are truth. “Look at me, sweetheart,” Joel crouches beside you, steadying presence at your side. “The last one… it will be the harshest. You understand why, don’t you?” Your lips press together, swallowing hard, brow furrowed. “Because… because it weighs the heaviest.” Joel’s lips curve into that unmistakable, approving smile. “Exactly right. But then… you’re done. Every single one atoned.” His fingers tuck a damp strand of hair behind your ear, brushing gently over your cheek, still glistening with tears. “And then I can take care of you, okay?” Your brow furrows in doubt. “But… isn’t that lust all over again?” His fingers trail lightly across your shoulder blade as you speak, lingering as though to reassure you. “Oh, you think this,” he gestures between you and him, “is the last sin’s misstep?” You hesitate, unsure. “Is it… not?” Joel chuckles, hand drifting along your side until it lands lightly on your reddened buttocks, tracing over the marks. “Oh angel, no. What we do here? That’s salvation. No sin in that.”

I am so so so so bad at tagging so whoever wants to share their WIP pleeeeaaaase do. I am excited to see what you all are cooking up!

@604to647 @arcane-fox @armandispunk @ashleyfilm @beardropascal @bergamote-catsandbooks @cozymochaa @daniel-bruhhl @daddyimfilthy @dinonuggiesgogrrrr @dotyoureyez @drunkennunicornn @ess-evo @fig-frog @flawssy-227 @glaszdoll @harriedandharassed @he-is-the-destined @honestlywork @iknowisoundcrazy @inept-the-magnificent @joelmillerspnk @kakiki3 @koshkaj-blog @lokigonnakmsforbucky @mcthsman @milla-frenchy @millermouth @missladym1981 @palelense @pedrofan @perpetualharpyresonance @pleurspetal @rhapsodicaesthete @rosharanfiction @rosebuds-and-moonlight @sawymredfox @simpingforjoel @soymiguelsesposa @speaktothehandpeasants @sprigsofhazel @tomtohee @twilightblogss @umadirectioner @untamedheart81 @vickie5446

“You’ll be fine,” you had teased, hugging her. “Kazeem’s a good replacement.”

“He is a shit replacement for shopping advice,” Amy had shot back, eyes wet but smile bright. “I’m telling you.”

You had laughed and cried, the way only true friends could.

Now, Christmas Eve had arrived. Dinner was done, the table cleared, your aunt and uncle and their two chaos-stirring nephews already gone. Your dad had fallen asleep in front of the TV, Sir Percival snoring at his feet. From the kitchen, faint clinks and running water signaled your mother cleaning up the last dishes.

You slipped on a coat, tugged a scarf around your neck, and stepped out into the night.

The sharp cold met you immediately, the kind that stung your nose and cheeks in the best possible way. Snow lay thick, glittering under the streetlamps. The woods beyond the houses stood dark, sentinel-like, with a few flakes drifting silently down. You had taken your phone, thinking you’d drown your thoughts with music or a podcast. Instead, silence greeted you like a friend you hadn’t seen in years.

You started to walk, boots crunching with each step.

The world outside was hushed in that particular Christmas way - streets abandoned, everyone inside by the fire or clustered at tables. Even the dogs weren’t barking. You pulled your scarf higher and let your breath steam into the frozen air, watching it rise and vanish.

Your thoughts, naturally, tangled around London. There was so much to do - flats to view, papers to sign, details to sort. Finding a flat would be chaos, but at least your new salary could cushion the hunt. Then there was the matter of your own apartment in New York. Keep it? Sublet it?

You chuckled softly to yourself, shaking your head. Whoever takes it, I’ll have to warn them about Creepy McPeepface for certain.

Your silent laughter drifted into the still night, quickly swallowed by snow as you shoved your hands deeper into the pockets, tilting your gaze to the sky. You should feel nothing but excitement. And you did - mostly. This was your chance, the kind of leap people prayed for. A fresh start. A city teeming with possibility. Autonomy. Distance.

But beneath that glitter of anticipation was a hollow you didn’t dare name.

Heartbreak.

You  had told yourself you wouldn’t think of him. That the silence was your choice, your space. But it hurt. God, it hurt to imagine him simply… shutting you out. Ego, self-protection, cowardice - whatever his reason, the result was the same.

It hurt that you had given him your body, your trust, your laughter, and that brief, terrifying vulnerability of being held by him - and now you were left with nothing but absence. It hurt that - 

Your phone chimed.

You froze, breath caught in your throat. Reflex pulled your hand from your pocket, fishing it out, clumsy in the cold.

A name. Simple letters across the screen. Harry C.

For a second, your knees nearly buckled.

Gloves. Damn gloves. You cursed softly, tugging them off with your teeth, your fingers stiff and red from the cold, though the shiver running through you wasn’t from winter air. You fumbled, tapped, opened.

The message filled the screen.

Emily,

I hope tonight finds you surrounded by warmth - family, laughter, a kind of peace you’ve more than earned.

I know you wanted space, and I intend to respect that. But I couldn’t let Christmas pass without reaching out.

I’m proud of you. More than proud - I’m in awe. You don’t need my approval, you never did, but I want you to know that you have it anyway.

Your choice is brave. It’s the right one. I will do everything in my power to make sure the road ahead is as smooth as possible - if you’ll let me.

I’ve wronged you. I can’t undo that, but I can try to make it right now.

Merry Christmas, Emily. From London, where the city is waiting for you.

H.

You blinked. Read. Reread. Again and again.

The words blurred as your vision burned, tears spilling hot onto your cheeks despite the cold. You swiped at them with the back of your hand, only for more to follow. The night remained silent, the snow steady, but inside your chest something cracked open.

It wasn’t just the ache of disappointment anymore, or the sting of silence. It was something far deeper, a loss you hadn’t allowed yourself to feel until now.

You missed him. You missed him with an ache that seemed to pull your bones hollow.

Your breath came uneven, fogging into the night as you clutched the phone tighter. Around you, the woods stretched dark and still, the snow falling steady as if nothing in the world had shifted. But for you, everything had.

For the first time, you let herself admit it: this hurt wasn’t only about distance, about decisions, about leaving New York.

It was about him. About Harry.

And the missing - the sharp, brutal missing - was almost too much to bear.

You lowered the phone slowly, slipping it back into your pocket, hands trembling. Snowflakes landed soft on your lashes and melted into the salt of your tears. The night pressed close, tender and unrelenting all at once.

You walked on, boots crunching, scarf pulled high. Your breath stuttered out in sharp little clouds. Each step carried you farther from the house, deeper into the silence.

You missed him. And God, it hurt.

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Because he hadn’t been tracking a cornered killer. He had been walking straight into the territory of someone who had been preparing for this kind of fight for years.

And now he was paying for it.

Max pressed his back harder against the rusted frame of a forgotten equipment trolley, the metal cold against his spine as his hand clamped down over the wound at his side. The pressure did little to ease the damage, but instinct demanded it anyway. Blood still seeped through his fingers, slower now, thicker, but not nearly fast enough to be reassuring.

Healing was working. He could feel it - faint and struggling to keep pace with the injury. That was the only reason he wasn’t already sprawled lifeless across the cracked flooring of the training hall.

But even that gift had limits.

Especially when he hadn’t fed properly due to the fact that a nosey beautiful neighbor had interrupted his very last meal.

Now there was nothing left to sustain him.

But what made it worse - what truly tipped the scales - were the traps.

Max’s jaw tightened as another distant ringing echoed faintly in his skull, a phantom reminder of the earlier detonations. They hadn’t been large, not enough to bring the structure down, but they didn’t need to be. The enclosed space amplified every sound, turning controlled blasts into disorienting shockwaves that rattled his senses and blurred his perception.

One wrong step had nearly cost him everything.

He had only avoided the worst of it by sheer luck, moving at the exact moment instinct screamed at him to do so. Even now, the aftereffects lingered - his hearing skewed, his balance subtly off, the world not quite aligning the way it should.

Torres had designed this place to break him down before the real fight even began.

“You know,” Torres’ voice carried through the space again, measured and deliberate, echoing from somewhere just out of sight, “without her, it would have taken me a lot longer to figure you out.”

He was closer now.

Worse: he was circling him.

Max exhaled slowly through his nose, forcing himself to focus despite the pain radiating from his side. He shifted just enough to glance down at the wound, his expression tightening at what he saw.

Yeah, not great at all.

His gaze lifted again, senses straining to track Torres’ movement or pinpoint his location.

“Yeah?” he shot back. “Did you tell her that before or after you cut her throat?”

There was a flicker of silence. Then -

“It was you who ruined her.” The raw hatred in Torres’ voice was unmistakable now. “You dragged her into this. You corrupted her with your very being and seduced her.”

Max let out a short, breathless snort despite the way it pulled painfully at his injury.

“Seduced her?” he echoed, incredulity threading through the words. “What century are you living in?” He shifted slightly, testing his balance, ignoring the way his body protested. “She didn’t need any seduction. She just fell for the guy next door. Happens all the time.”

“Enough!”

The crack of the gunshot split the air a second later, sharp and violent, the bullet embedding itself somewhere behind him with a jarring impact.

Max stilled, muscles coiling instinctively despite the disadvantage.

“You contaminated her,” Torres continued, his voice rising with conviction. “I was just in time to save her.”

That did it.

A disbelieving laugh broke free from Max before he could stop it, edged with something dangerously close to hysteria. The sound echoed strangely in the hollow space, almost as distorted as the logic it responded to.

For a fleeting moment, the temptation surfaced - to tell him. To throw the truth back in his face. To make him realize that Torres’ very own actions had led to the one thing he had wanted to protect you from becoming the thing he hunted.

But the thought died just as quickly.

The wound was too fresh.

The betrayal still too raw.

That wasn’t a weapon he was willing to use - not like this.

Unfortunately for Max, Torres possessed an entire arsenal of weapons he very clearly intended to use - tools designed not merely to wound, but to dismantle every advantage a creature like him relied upon. And the worst part was not the pain. It was the unfamiliarity. The terrible realization that he did not fully understand what was happening to him until it was already too late to counter it.

Max pushed away from the cover of the equipment trolley, teeth gritted as he forced movement back into his body. His instincts screamed at him to close the distance, to end this before Torres could tighten the trap any further. But the second he shifted forward, another sensation crashed violently into his already overloaded senses.

Blood.

Everywhere.

A harsh metallic groan echoed overhead before the old sprinkler system sputtered violently to life. What should once have released water instead unleashed a dark, heavy downpour that hammered against the training hall in wet, uneven bursts. Thick droplets splattered across the floor, across the walls, across him.

The smell hit instantly.

Not human but animal, probably pig’s blood, if he had to guess - but the distinction barely mattered. The sheer volume alone was enough to send his senses spiraling. The scent flooded the air with suffocating intensity, hot iron and salt saturating every molecule around him until there was nothing else left to breathe.

One part of his mind still clung desperately to focus, to the sharp edge of the hunt, to the rage driving him forward toward Torres. But another part - older and fully instinctive - reacted with something far more primal. Hunger surged through him with humiliating force, sudden and impossible to ignore.

It wouldn’t matter if he had fed recently. Didn’t matter that he had more pressing concerns than appetite. Blood on that scale bypassed reason entirely. It hit the mind like temptation carved into instinct itself, the same irresistible pull as food set before someone who swore they weren’t hungry until the smell reached them.

Only this was worse.

Much worse.

The crimson rain drenched him within seconds, soaking through his clothes, plastering dark curls against his forehead and temples as droplets streaked down his face. The world narrowed beneath the assault of scent and sound until coherent thought became slippery and fragmented.

And in that haze, Torres moved.

Fully advancing now instead of retreating. The hunter closing in on wounded prey within terrain built for him.

Somewhere through the ringing in his skull and the relentless pounding of blood against concrete, Max heard it - the unmistakable metallic click of a gun being readied.

His head snapped toward the sound instinctively.

Too slow.

The shot exploded through the hall a heartbeat later, deafening in the enclosed space as the muzzle flash tore through the red-soaked darkness.

The gunshot cracked through the night like a rupture in reality itself.

You stopped dead in your tracks.

One second you had been moving through the skeletal remains of the old training grounds with growing certainty, following the trail that had led you here. The next, every muscle in your body locked as the echo rolled through the empty corridors and settled deep beneath your skin.

Torres.

You had known he would come here the moment the idea surfaced in your mind. Floyd Bennett had been too symbolic, too steeped in memory for someone like him to resist. Their first years at the academy had unfolded inside these walls. Long nights. Endless drills. Bruised knuckles and exhausted laughter over vending machine coffee. Back when you had still trusted him enough to put your life in his hands.

The irony of that nearly made you sick.

But there had been something else too. Another trail you had caught halfway here, one that had gotten to you when another violent wave of hunger had torn through your body hard enough to make your knees weaken. In that moment of forced stillness, while your senses sharpened painfully against the city night, another scent had threaded itself unmistakably through Torres’.

Max.

At first you had assumed it lingered on your clothes, buried in the fabric of the oversized pajama shirt you still wore. Confused and irritated, you had actually lifted the collar to your face, inhaling like that might explain it away.

It hadn’t.

The scent had been in the air itself.

And now, stepping fully into the abandoned training building, there was no mistaking it anymore.

Except it was nearly drowned out by something else.

The smell of blood hit you with such force it felt physical, like slamming into a wall at full speed. It saturated the air in suffocating waves, thick and metallic and overwhelming enough to make your stomach twist violently with need. Instinct roared awake inside you immediately, sharp enough to hurt. Hunger clawed through your body with renewed desperation, every nerve suddenly tuned toward the scent flooding the building.

But beneath that hunger came something colder.

Everything about this felt wrong.

You forced yourself forward before instinct could fully overtake reason. Your sprint echoed through the abandoned corridors as you followed the fading reverberation of the gunshot deeper into the structure. Cracked tiles blurred beneath your feet. Graffiti flashed along rotting walls. Somewhere overhead old pipes groaned faintly beneath the strain of age.

You didn’t think. Didn’t plan. You simply followed the pull of it - the blood, the fear, the unmistakable collision of two scents you now knew too well.

Then you saw the double doors reading BALCONY. Without hesitation you shoved through them at full speed.

And stopped so abruptly it almost hurt.

The sight below looked less like reality and more like something torn from a fever dream.

The massive training hall spread beneath you, instantly recognizable despite the years of decay that had hollowed it out. Once it had been the pride of the academy. Now it looked abandoned to rot. Paint peeled in long strips from the walls. Mold crept through corners. Sections of the flooring had warped and cracked with neglect.

And from the ceiling, actual blood rained down in relentless sheets.

It poured from the old sprinkler system in dark streams that splashed across the gym floor and gathered in spreading pools, turning the entire hall into something grotesque and surreal beneath the pale wash of moonlight filtering through the upper windows.

Two figures stood in the center of it.

One of them was unmistakably Torres.

Even from above you recognized the rigid line of his posture, the broad set of his shoulders, a gun clenched steady in his hand. He stood upright despite the carnage around him, composed in a way that made your stomach churn.

The other -

Your breath caught.

Max.

Except standing was generous.

He looked barely held together, hunched forward as one hand pressed hard against his side. Blood soaked through him, impossible to distinguish now beneath the crimson pouring from above. His movements lacked their usual certainty. As Torres advanced another deliberate step, Max staggered backward awkwardly, like his body no longer obeyed him correctly.

Even from this distance you could feel the shift in Torres as he opened his mouth, clearly preparing another self-righteous speech or threat.

You didn’t let him speak.

Whatever fury burned inside you toward Max, whatever betrayal still sat raw and bleeding between you - Torres did not get to decide his fate.

“Stop! Police!”

The words tore from you automatically, pure instinct and muscle memory overriding everything else. It was absurd. Meaningless. Maybe even technically untrue now. But the command still carried authority sharpened by years of use.

And it worked.

Torres’ head snapped upward.

At the same moment Max stumbled fully to the floor, collapsing hard onto one knee before catching himself with visible effort. His gaze lifted too, dazed and unfocused for a heartbeat, like he genuinely thought he was hallucinating you.

But Torres looked worse.

He looked haunted.

“Ashley…?” Your name cracked apart in his throat, disbelief stripping all certainty from his voice.

“Drop the gun!” you shouted back, gripping the railing so tightly your hands ached beneath the pressure.

His arm lowered slightly on instinct, confusion momentarily overriding aggression. “How are you- ?”

Movement below interrupted him. Max shifted weakly, trying to rise again. Torres reacted instantly, snapping the weapon back toward him with renewed panic.

“I said lower it!” This time rage bled openly into your voice.

“He’s a monster, Ashley!” Torres shouted back. “You don’t understand what -”

Then he stopped.

His eyes flicked from Max to you and back again.

You actually saw the realization happen. A horrible little click behind his gaze as the pieces aligned.

“What did you do…?” The words came quiet, trembling slightly as he stared at Max.

Max moved like he wanted to answer, but whatever response he intended dissolved into pain instead. His hand clamped harder over the wound at his side.

Torres stepped closer and the gun rose again, unmistakable intent behind it.

Your eyes darted wildly across the balcony. Stairs - there, on the far side - but too far away. Too slow. You wouldn’t reach them in time.

Below you, Torres’ face twisted with fury.

“What did you do?!” The scream echoed violently through the hall.

Then came the click of the safety releasing.

You didn’t think after that.

You moved.

In one fluid motion you vaulted the railing. The drop vanished beneath instinct and momentum. You hit the floor hard enough that it should have shattered bone, rolled through the impact effortlessly, and came up already sprinting. Distance collapsed unnaturally fast beneath your feet. The world blurred into blood and fury.

You barely remembered crossing the space between them.

One second Torres stood aiming the gun.

The next you slammed into him with enough force to send both of you crashing violently to the ground. The shot discharged somewhere in the chaos, deafening at that range, but you didn’t see where it went.

All you knew was impact.

Momentum.

And then Torres beneath you as you hit the blood-slick floor together, ending above him with brutal force, pinning him down.

“I thought you were dead.” The words left Torres in a shaken breath, and somehow that was the worst part of all. There was no triumph in his voice, no cruelty, no satisfaction. Only genuine remorse, as though he believed he had failed you personally.

You stared down at him in disbelief, rain after rain of dark blood cascading from the broken sprinklers above you. The copper stench was unbearable now, thick enough to coat the inside of your throat, mixing with sweat, gunpowder, fear and the sharp electric scent of Max’s wounded body somewhere next to you.

Torres tried to speak again, apology already forming.

“Save it!” you snapped before he could finish.

You kicked the gun from his hand just as his fingers twitched toward it again. Your voice cracked through the ruined hall with enough force to silence even the echoing drip of blood from above.

“I have had it with you and your twisted words!”

Torres looked up at you from beneath and somehow he still looked at you like he pitied you. Like you were the tragedy here.

“Ashley you have to understand”, he looked up to you, pleadingly and not even making a move on getting away from you as your fingers dug into his shoulders. “I wanted to save you.”

You laughed once, breathless and bitter.

“Like you saved Samantha?” you shot back. “Keira? Lara? Abigail?” Each name landed like a strike. “You saved them too?”

Torres hesitated, and that hesitation was enough for your anger to spike. You shook him hard, fury blazing through your gold-lit eyes.

“The only monster here is you,” you hissed. “And I trusted your words for far too long.”

You could hear everything now. Every frantic beat of his pulse hammering beneath your hands. Every sharp inhale scraping through his lungs. Fear poured from him in rich, intoxicating waves. It filled the air alongside the copper stench flooding the gymnasium until your body reacted instinctively, your mouth watering despite the hatred twisting through your chest.

“You don’t deserve a trial,” you said then.

Your eyes flicked toward Max.

He was still several feet away, collapsed against the ruined floor. Blood soaked through his side in dark sheets, nearly black beneath the crimson rain falling from above. He had managed to push himself partially upright onto trembling arms, but only barely. His face was pale beneath the streaks of blood, jaw tight with pain, eyes locked entirely on you.

Your name formed soundlessly on his lips.

And that single moment of distraction was enough.

Torres moved violently beneath you. You barely had time to react before he twisted hard, throwing his weight sideways and sending you crashing onto your back against the soaked floor. Pain jolted through your spine as he rolled over you instantly, pinning you beneath him with desperate strength born from pure survival instinct.

The world blurred for a second beneath the overwhelming sensory chaos around you.

You saw the gun lying only inches away.

Both of you lunged for it at once.

Your fingers brushed cold metal -

Then Torres slammed his forearm across your throat.

The pressure did not choke you. You no longer needed air for that. But something about the compression still disrupted your senses instantly, sending static across your vision and dulling the sharp clarity you had only just begun learning to navigate. The edges of the room smeared into darkness as his weight crushed down harder.

The gun scraped against your fingertips again but Torres reached it first.

You froze as the barrel swung toward your face. For one terrible second, everything stopped, only the sheets of crimson rain continued to coat you both. Torres looked down at you with unbearable sadness etched into every line of his face as his trembling finger tightened against the trigger.

Then suddenly he was ripped away from you.

Max hit him like a wrecking ball.

The collision sent both men sprawling across the soaked floor, Torres losing grip on the gun as Max tackled him sideways with what little strength he still had left. But the effort cost him immediately. You heard the broken sound tear from Max’s throat before he collapsed hard onto the floor, coughing sharply as pain bent him nearly double.

Meanwhile Torres recovered faster. He rolled onto one knee and snatched the gun back up, swinging it toward Max -

You moved before he could fire.

You hit him with enough force to send a sickening crack through the hall as your foot connected with his arm. Torres screamed, the gun flying free once more as bones shattered beneath the impact. You didn’t stop. Another kick slammed into his chest hard enough to launch him backward across the soaked floor.

He crashed flat onto his back.

You followed immediately. Your foot planted against his chest with crushing force, pinning him there.

“Don’t you dare touch him,” you hissed down at him, every word trembling with fury as your heel dug deeper into his chest. “Don’t you ever touch anyone again.”

Torres stared up at you through pain, blood running from the corner of his mouth now. His expression twisted somewhere between horror and heartbreak as he searched your face for something that no longer existed there.

You could feel your hunger roaring now, louder than thought itself. Your tongue darted to your canines.

“I hate you,” you snarled, “for what you did to all of them.” Your eyes darkened. “But I despise you for what you condemned me to.” The hunger inside you roared alive completely. “And that,” you whispered, leaning down toward him at last, “is what I want you to be your last thought: You failed me and this failure will be your end.”

The skin of his throat tore instantly beneath your fangs and the sensation of fresh blood flooding your mouth numbed everything around you - the splattering of the heavy wetness from above, Max’s strained breathing and most of all:

Torres’ final agonizing scream.

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You’d hidden the pain well enough, throwing yourself into “home office” mode. Dialing into only the most essential calls, rattling off information to Harry with clipped professionalism before vanishing again. No meetings, no video cameras, no lingering exchanges. You buried the rest of your time in your mother’s lists: wrapping gifts, chopping vegetables, running errands into town.

If anyone noticed how quiet you’d gone, no one said a word.

But tonight, in your old bedroom, the house soft around you, the mask cracked.

You sat cross-legged on the quilt, laptop perched precariously on the edge of your knees. The glow lit your face, but your fingers hovered above the keys, unmoving.

Catherine Dalton’s email waited, patient and damning.

The subject line unchanged: Follow up: Open Position.

The body: a polite nudge, gracious as only Catherine could be. A reminder that the decision window closed by end of business today. A space left open for you to say yes or no.

Your chest squeezed.

You’d spun in circles over it with Amy - on late-night calls, in endless text threads. Amy, ever practical beneath the squealing support, had pointed out every pro and con. The prestige of Dalton & Price. The leap in title - junior partner on the merger team, London based, shoulder to shoulder with some of the best in the field. Exactly what you always wanted, Amy had reminded you.

And it was true.

In college, you had dreamed of this kind of offer. You had studied yourself half sick for the chance to even land an internship in a firm like Dalton. You’d wanted big rooms, high stakes, the kind of projects that made your pulse race with adrenaline.

Parson had been different. Steadier. Safer. The pay had been good, the structure reassuring. You’d carved out your place there like a stone in a riverbed, holding against the current. And for a long time, that had been enough.

Until Harry. Until London. Until you’d been seen, really seen, for what you could do.

Now Dalton & Price had cracked the door wide open. And all you had to do was walk through it.

Your fingers traced the laptop edge instead of typing.

London.

Not just a new job. A new city. A new country. Six months, at least. Grey skies and fast trains and a life you couldn’t even picture. Not to forget: driving on the left!

You’d visited, sure, but to live there? In the dead of winter? To find a flat, a rhythm, a whole new version of yourself?

Your stomach flipped.

And leaving New York. Leaving Amy. Leaving the friendships you’d built, the fragile scaffolding of a life you’d finally made your own.

Leaving Harry.

The thought stabbed so fast you almost shut the laptop. You hadn’t let yourself dwell on him these past days - not beyond the most sterile updates you still had to exchange for work. It was easier to pretend he was just a name on the other side of an email thread.

But in truth, his absence had been everywhere. In the silence after your fight. In the ache of the words you hadn’t said. In the cold space where his steadiness had always been, even before you’d let him in closer than you should have.

Why didn’t you tell me?

Your own voice, breaking. His, low and pleading.

Because I wasn’t ready to let you go.

You shoved the memory away, hard.

This wasn’t about him. It couldn’t be.

You stared at the draft email, cursor blinking. The text you’d carefully prepared explained everything: your apologies for the delay, your gratitude for the offer, your reasoning for the hesitation. It was clear, respectful, perfectly professional.

Your laptop felt heavier than it should. You leaned back against the headboard, then slid lower until you were lying flat, the computer still balanced across your thighs, screen glowing above you.

The ceiling hadn’t changed in years. The same tiny crack near the light fixture, the same faint water stain from the leak in middle school. You’d spent nights staring at it when you were fifteen and certain you’d never escape this town. Nights when your dreams felt too sharp, too impossible.

Now here you were again, pinned by the same ceiling, except the dreams weren’t impossible anymore. They were sitting in your inbox.

You heard your mother clattering in the kitchen downstairs, your father’s low voice, Sir Percival barking at nothing. Dinner would be soon. A weekend of cozy chaos ahead, the holidays rushing toward you like a tide.

And yet the cursor blinked. End of business today. Catherine’s polite patience waiting to expire.

You took a long breath.

Then you clicked to the bottom of your draft, the words of apology and delay already rehearsed, tidy and measured. Anyone reading would think you’d chosen safety, that you’d stayed put.

But beneath them, you added one last line.

Your finger hovered one final second. Then you hit send.

The email flew, your laptop chimed, and the weight in your chest shifted.

You closed the lid, the room dimming to soft shadows. For the first time all week, you let yourself smile.

The suitcase waited open on his bed, half-packed. A neat row of sweaters, a few jeans, some books he’d never had the time to read. CEOs carried their work habits on trips - they just looked a little less formal in flannel and well-worn denim.

Harry stood, mind ticking through lists: clothes, laptop, chargers, documents, the minor but maddening logistics of travel. London. Finally. Tommy would be home by Christmas, and Harry was looking forward to stepping out of the unrelenting rhythm of New York.

The laptop, closed, sat at the edge of the bed. He glanced at it as if it might somehow remind him of his responsibilities without needing to be opened. Almost like it sensed the storm waiting inside.

He hesitated, then picked it up. A final check before shutting it down and focusing on packing. Inbox: 47 unread emails. Work, logistics, the mundane and the urgent - but one subject line made him pause.

Follow up: Open Position – Emily Day.

His chest tightened.

He let his fingers hover over it. He wanted to stall. Wanted to let himself imagine every possible outcome. You could have declined. You could have accepted. You could have asked him first. And if you had? Could you have found a way to manage both the career leap and… whatever this was between you?

He clicked.

The email opened, crisp, professional, concise.

From: Emily Day

To: Catherine Dalton

CC: Harry Castillo

Subject: Follow up: Open Position

Dear Catherine,

Please accept my apologies for the delay in responding. I greatly appreciate the offer extended and the patience you have shown as I considered this opportunity.

After careful consideration, I have weighed my current responsibilities and the future growth prospects at Dalton & Price. The potential to contribute to the merger project and to engage at a higher level within your team aligns closely with my professional aspirations.

I understand the importance of timely communication and thank you again for your understanding regarding the delay. I am very grateful for the confidence you and your team have placed in me.

With that in mind, I am more than happy to take on this new adventure with you.

Best regards,

Emily Day

Harry sat back in his chair.

Sick. The word didn’t quite cover it. It was heavier, tighter, a combination of dread and… something else he couldn’t yet name. Pride. Regret. Anger. Relief? All tangled together in one tight knot that made his stomach churn.

He reread the email, cursoring slowly over your words. Polite, professional, apologetic. No hint of blame. No mention of him. Your CC was a courtesy, a formality. He was a silent observer, not a participant in your decision.

His chest tightened further. He would lose you - he already had, in a way. And worse, he had known this moment was coming. He could have prevented it. He could have explained, been transparent, laid the facts out for you when the offer was first discussed. But he had stalled. He had stalled selfishly.

He toyed with the idea of responding immediately. Taking responsibility for your delay in answering. Writing some note that would somehow bridge the space between you.

But he knew better. To interject would undermine your autonomy, make you pause, second-guess your choice.

No. He had to let your own voice speak. The CC was enough for him. A silent, perfect acknowledgment: he was in the loop, but he was not in control.

The suitcase beside him suddenly seemed small, trivial, compared to the weight of your decision. London, family, Tommy… all of it faded to the background, the hum of the city outside, the pending flight. He had work to finish, but none of it mattered in the face of what you had just chosen.

His mind replayed your last interactions, your arguments, your tone, the plea for space. Every word he had spoken - or failed to speak - looped endlessly. He would have told you. He could have told you. Yet you had moved, decisively, without him. That had been your right. That had always been your right.

And still… it felt like a punch to the gut.

The realization was brutal: he hadn’t just almost lost you to a city. He had lost you to the very idea that he didn’t see your worth, that he couldn’t support your ambitions.

You had acted in your best interest, carefully, with elegance and poise. You had chosen the adventure. And he could do nothing but watch.

He breathed as if he could force some of the anxiety from his lungs. Fingers splayed over the desk, still holding the laptop. The coldness of the surface grounded him. He stared at the words one last time. 

I am more than happy to take on this new adventure with you.

That was the punchline. The full stop. A declaration he could not ignore. You had not declined. You had embraced it.

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