Page 80 of Into Pitch

And there it is. The bright, ugly truth. Clean and unapologetic. One that no matter how hard I fight, I can’t get away from, because he’s buried into me. So deep that I have no clue where he begins and I end anymore.

So I deflate a bit.

“I don’t hate you,” I mutter. “And that scares the hell out of me.”

“It shouldn’t. Hatred would be simpler to figure out though.”

“I’m not looking for simple.”

“Neither am I,” he sighs.

We sit here, this tension humming between us that isn’t sexual this time. Something far quieter and more dangerous. Connection.

I push my plate to the side. “This doesn’t mean I’m okay with everything you’ve done.”

“I wouldn’t expect you to be.”

“And it doesn’t mean I won’t try to leave again.” I lie.

His lips curve, knowing. “I would be disappointed if you didn’t consider it.”

I sigh, dragging my hands to clasp them behind my head, cupping it as I hold his gaze. “So, what happens now?”

He rises this time and I watch him as he crosses around the table, placing his hand on the table beside me without actually touching me.

“Now we don’t do anything reckless.”

I snort. “That ship may have sailed.”

“Not like that,” he muses. “The next time we sleep together, it will be because you came to me.”

My brows furrow as he says that, but he’s not done.

“Not in anger or fear, nor reaction. But because you want to.”

“And if I never do?” Another lie wrapped inside of a simple question.

“Then we don’t.”

I purse my lips and nod, resting back in my chair as I look up to him.

“You’re playing a very dangerous game, Alexander.” I tease softly.

His mouth lilts, just barely. “You started it with the crowbar.”

“That’s debatable,” I snort despite myself.

We stand there for a long moment, neither of us crossing the line he’s so clearly drawn in the sand. And when he finally steps back, giving me space, it feels more intimate than anything else we’ve done.

I don’t follow him as he walks away, but I don’t run either.

And maybe that’s okay.

The lake looks like an exquisitely kept secret.

Not in the dramatic way Pitch was, but a kind of quiet secret that feels like it belongs entirely to itself. Mist hovers low over the surface, thin as breath, and the water reflects the sky in that delicate, early-morning blue that makes everything feel temporarily forgivable.

I didn’t know places like this could even exist.