The sun came slow, brushing the horizon in gold and quiet.
Erica lay still beneath the quilt, the warmth of the man beside her settling into her skin like a memory that never left. His arm rested across her waist, fingers half-curled, breath slow against her shoulder blade.
Michael.
She knew his name now.
But that hadn’t always been the case.
She turned her face toward the window, watching the light shift on the far wall. Morning always had a certain silence unlike the night’s hush, which was born of concealment. Morning was honest. Soft but ruthless.
And honest mornings had never been kind to her.
Especially not the first time.
She remembered it-him-like a moment trapped in amber. A bar in Barcelona. Summer pressing against the city like a fever. She’d been running from grief, he
