Page 20 of Bear Naked Truth
He didn’t need to ask which cold. He could still feel the ghost of it too—the Hollow Man’s presence lingering like smoke in the corners of his mind.
He sat on the end of the bed, not touching her, not pressing. Justthere.
“You’ve banished spirits before,” he said after a long silence. “Lots of them.”
She nodded.
“But this one…” His voice dropped. “He’s different.”
Autumn’s gaze met his. Steady. Haunted.
“He’s not just angry,” she said. “He’s… aware. Calculated. Most ghosts are loops—grief on repeat, trauma echoing until it fades. But this thing? Heknowswhat he’s doing. He’s picking his moments. Testing me.”
“No,” Dorian said quietly. “He’s testingus.”
That surprised her. She blinked.
He leaned back against the headboard, stretching out beside her with the kind of ease that only came from a man comfortable in his skin. He wasn’t trying to crowd her—just share the space.
Her voice was low. “You think it’s because of… whatever this thing is between us?”
“I think he sees it,” Dorian said. “And I think he hates it.”
Autumn stared down at her tea. “Maybe he’s not the only one.”
He glanced sideways. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
She shrugged one shoulder. “Just… maybe I’m not built for this. For being close. Every time it starts to feel good, I remember why I stopped letting people in.”
He didn’t answer right away. He let the silence settle again, let the house breathe.
Then he said, “When I was thirteen, I got caught in a thunderstorm on the edge of Bear’s Hollow.”
She looked up, brow furrowed. “Random segue.”
“Hang on.” He smiled faintly. “It was pitch black. My flashlight died. I tripped over a root and landed face-first in a creek bed. Thought I was gonna die right there. But then I saw this flicker of light—tiny, maybe ten yards off. I thought it was fireflies at first.”
“What was it?”
“Turns out? It was a lantern left by a local hunter. Left it for a friend who got lost years before. Said he never found him, but he always left a light. Just in case.”
Autumn was silent.
Dorian turned toward her slightly. “Point is, sometimes the thing that finds you in the dark isn’t a monster. Sometimes it’s a light someone left behind. Something saying, ‘Hey, I got you.’”
She looked at him like she wanted to argue. Then she just… didn’t.
Instead, she reached up, tugged gently at the sleeve of his shirt. “Stay?”
The single word hit him like a punch to the gut.
He moved slow, like not to spook her, kicking off his boots and sliding onto the bed beside her, keeping a respectful distance. The kind of closeness that saidI’m here if you want me,notI need something from you.
She lay on her side facing him, tea abandoned on the nightstand, fingers curled under her chin. He couldn’t stop watching her—how the flicker of the lamp caught in hereyes, how the vulnerability softened the edges of her usual guardedness.
“Do you believe in past lives?” she asked suddenly.
He blinked. “You mean, like déjà vu or fate or…”
