Enchanted With My Security

What I Can’t Say Straight

Francis drove on in silence, his face calm and unreadable in the soft glow of the dashboard.

That only stoked my frustration.

How could he be so still? So quiet? Didn't he feel it—the pull between us, the tension thick enough to taste? The way something had shifted and wouldn't shift back?

I let out a sharp breath and turned to the window. “She was pretty.”

His hands stayed steady on the wheel. “Who?”

I clenched my jaw. “You know who.”

A beat passed. “Emma?”

“Of course it’s Emma,” I snapped, sharper than I meant to be. “The girl at the wine bar. Perfect eyeliner, like she was ready for a close-up. And that smirk? Like she already had your number saved.”

“She’s a waitress, Marie.”

“And she knew your order by heart.”

“She’s supposed to. It’s her job.”

I turned toward him, the words spilling out now. “She looked like she’d been waiting for you to walk in again. Like she knew you in some way I don’t. That’s not nothing.”

He glanced over, then back at the road. “Why does it matter?”

The question landed like a stone in my chest. I hated that it did. Hated even more that I had no good answer.

“It doesn’t,” I said quickly.

“Sounds like it does.”

My hands balled in my lap. “Maybe it does, okay?” My voice cracked. “I didn’t like how she looked at you. As if she already had a version of you I’ve never seen.”

He didn’t respond, but I could feel his eyes on me—steady, patient, too knowing.

“It’s stupid,” I said, quieter now. “Because I don’t even know what this is. You work for me—or at least that’s the story. But you’re not just the gatekeeper anymore. Not to me.”

I swallowed hard, trying to keep my voice from breaking. “You say things I carry around all day. You look at me like I’m not always on the edge of falling apart. You make me feel like... someone else. Someone I don’t hate.”

The silence pressed in.

“And then someone else smiles at you,” I whispered, “and I feel it—this twist in my stomach like I’m losing something I never had the right to want.”

Finally, he spoke—low, calm. “You’re allowed to care.”

I shook my head. “No, I’m not. I’m supposed to be composed. In control. My name is a currency. I’m not supposed to care if some girl pours you a glass of wine with a smile.”

The gravel crunched beneath the tires as the estate trees came into view.

“I noticed,” he said softly.

I blinked. “What?”

“The way you shut down when she said my name. The way your mouth tightened. I noticed. I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want to embarrass you.”

A laugh escaped me—bitter, half-sad. “Congratulations. You’ve embarrassed me anyway.”

He slowed to a stop near the driveway, put the car in park, and finally turned to face me. The shadows from the dash lights moved across his face like water.

“Marie,” he said gently.

I didn’t want to look at him. But I did.

“I never gave her my number,” he said. “Never took hers. Never stayed longer than one glass. And I never went there with anyone else.”

My breath caught.

“When I brought you there tonight—it was different. It meant something.”

My chest felt tight. “Then why didn’t you just say that?”

He smiled faintly. “Because you were too busy accusing me of charming waitresses.”

“I wasn’t accusing,” I murmured. “I was… panicking.”

“Why?”

I met his gaze. There was no point in running from it now.

“Because I like you, Francis,” I said, my voice barely above a whisper. “And I don’t know how to be this person. The one who wants someone who might not want her back.”

His expression shifted—softened. Something deeper stirred behind his eyes.

“I do want you, Marie,” he said. “I’ve been waiting for you to stop pretending you don’t care.”

I stared at him, stunned.

“I see the way you look at me when you think I’m not paying attention. I hear the edge in your voice when you’re angry—not because I’ve done something wrong, but because you’re scared to admit it’s not anger at all. It’s something else.”

I gave a shaky laugh and leaned back against the seat. “You think you know everything.”

“I only know what you show me.”

I exhaled, voice smaller. “I didn’t want to be the jealous girl tonight. The one picking fights over someone else. But I was. And it hurt more than I expected.”

He didn’t say anything at first.

Then he reached over, slow and sure, and took my hand.

His thumb brushed over my knuckles—warm, grounding. Real.

“You’re not the jealous girl,” he said. “You’re the woman who finally let herself feel something real.”

I looked down at our hands, my chest so full it almost ached.

“You make it hard to hate you,” I whispered.

“I’m not trying to be hated,” he said. “I’m trying to be seen.”

The quiet that followed wasn’t awkward. It was something gentler. Something I didn’t want to break.

Outside, the wind stirred the branches overhead. Inside, all I could hear was my own breath and the weight of a truth I wasn’t running from anymore.

I just wanted to stay in it. Let it breathe.

Then my phone buzzed sharply on the dash.

The screen lit up with a message from an unknown number:

**You don’t know the half of it. Be careful with him.**

My blood ran cold.

I looked at Francis—his eyes on mine, calm but unreadable—and felt something shift. A new kind of fear slid in under the warmth.

Something was coming.

And whatever it was, it had just begun.