Page 47 of The Last Call Home
“When I saw you two in your coffee shop ...”I let out a dry laugh, more breath than sound.“Call me crazy, but it looked like something I didn’t think I’d ever get to have.”
I take a step closer to her, then stop myself.Stay grounded.“I thought maybe—just maybe—I could build something tangible, real, out of everything that fucking broke me.”
That’s the truth.Not some scripted intel bullshit.This is the scraped-knuckles, two-a.m.-vomiting-up-guilt kind of truth.Not just about Malerick.About her.Because I see it in her eyes—how she looks at both of us like she’s already halfway gone and we’re the drop and the impact she won’t survive.
“You shouldn’t have come back,” Malerick says.
His voice is smoke and sandpaper, tearing through the quiet.He turns, finally, and meets my gaze.His eyes are dark.Closed-off.But I can still read them like a fucking confession.“You should’ve left it buried.”
I snap before I can stop myself.“You’re one to talk.Hiding here like you’re not bleeding out every time someone gets too close.I’ve seen corpses more alive than you when she walks in the room.”
His jaw twitches.That’s the only sign I get.But it’s enough.
Now they’re both staring at me.Malerick with fury he’s trying not to feel, and Delilah with something worse—something that feels like understanding.Compassion.
And, fuck, that’s more dangerous than rage.
“Here’s the part you won’t like,” I say, dragging my voice low.Truth is a blade now, and I’m handing it to them handle-first.“I’m not here to fall in love.I’m here because the Hollow Syndicate has its claws in this town, and someone’s got to dig them out.”
“And me?”Delilah asks.“Where do I fit into your mission?Was he right?Am I just a toy?”
It’s not a whisper.It’s not a plea.
It’s a challenge.She’s daring me to give her everything that’s needed.
“You weren’t supposed to be a part of this.”
Her throat bobs like she’s swallowing a thousand words she won’t say.
“But now ...”I take a breath, and it feels like I’m standing naked in a goddamn hurricane.“Now I thinkyoumight be the reason I stay after it’s over.”
Malerick exhales.It hits like a slow, inevitable collapse.I feel it in my bones.In the space between my ribs where regret lives.
Then she says it.
“Then tell me,” Delilah whispers.“Tell me what you want.”
And that?
That’s where it all starts to unravel.
Because I want too much.
I want her mouth.Her laugh.Her anger.
I want the nights where she pushes me away and the mornings where she pulls me close like maybe—just maybe—I make the air easier to breathe.
I want Malerick’s silence turned into sound.I want the way he used to look at me like I was gravity itself—like I was the only thing keeping him from drifting too far.
I want something that looks like belonging.Not safety.Not convenience.
Belonging.
“I want ...”My voice falters, then rebuilds itself into something honest.Raw.“I want to stop pretending I never loved this man, who never let me love him.”
Silence.
“And I want to stop pretending I didn’t walk into that coffee shop and fall for you the second you told me to pay for my own fucking coffee.”
