CHAPTER ELEVEN
616 Words
Nyx
I don’t mean to follow him.
That’s the lie I tell myself as I step into the hallway after his door clicks shut. As if my feet didn’t already know where they were going. As if my body hasn’t been leaning toward his gravity since the moment he decided I was worth protecting.
Alexander stops at the bottom of the stairs.
Slowly.
Deliberately.
He doesn’t turn around.
“You should go back to bed,” he says.
I descend one step. Then another.
“I can’t sleep,” I reply.
“I know.”
That answer sends a shiver through me.
He turns then, fully facing me. The house is dim, lit only by the low glow of the hallway lamp. Shadows carve his features sharper, harder. Less forgiving.
“You’re standing too close,” he says quietly.
I stop one step above him. Close enough to feel his warmth. Close enough to smell clean soap and something deeper beneath it—control, maybe. Or restraint burning slow.
“You said nothing would happen unless I wanted it to,” I say.
His jaw tightens.
“I also said wanting isn’t the same as acting.”
“What if I don’t know the difference anymore?”
That finally makes him move.
He steps closer — not into me, not touching — but near enough that my breath stutters. His hand comes up, stopping just beside my hip. Not on me. Never on me.
A deliberate choice.
“You’re standing on a line,” he says, voice low. “And so am I.”
My pulse pounds. “Then step back.”
He doesn’t.
Neither do I.
“This isn’t about desire,” he continues. “This is about timing. Power. Consequence.”
“I’m not a child,” I whisper.
“I know,” he says. “That’s what makes this dangerous.”
I look up at him, really look — the tension in his shoulders, the restraint in his hands, the way his eyes darken when they flick to my mouth and immediately away.
“You think you’re protecting me from you,” I say.
His breath deepens.
“I’m protecting you from what happens after,” he answers.
“After what?”
“After I stop stopping myself.”
The words land like fire.
I lift my hand before I can think — not to touch him, just to exist closer. My fingers hover inches from his chest.
He stills completely.
“Nyx,” he warns softly.
I swallow. “Tell me to stop.”
Silence.
His hand lifts then — slow, controlled — and gently closes around my wrist.
The contact is brief.
Electric.
Enough to steal my breath.
“Stop,” he says.
I freeze.
He releases me immediately, stepping back like the touch burned him.
“That,” he says, voice steady but tight, “is as far as this goes tonight.”
I nod, heart racing, body humming with something unfinished.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper.
He shakes his head. “Don’t apologize for wanting.”
“Then what do I do with it?”
He meets my gaze, something raw slipping through the cracks of his control.
“You survive it,” he says. “Until the day you don’t have to.”
I turn and go back upstairs before I change my mind.
In my room, I press my hand to my wrist where he touched me.
It still feels warm.
Still feels claimed.
And for the first time, I realize the truth I’ve been avoiding.
I don’t just want Alexander Blackwood.
I want the moment he finally decides
restraint is no longer the right choice.
- Writer
