Page 45 of North’s Claim

“No,” I whisper.

“Then tell him that.”

I snap my eyes up at her. “It’s not that easy.”

“Why not?”

“Because this… all of this… it’s the first time I’ve had something good, and I’m scared that the moment I say I want it, it’ll be taken away.”

The tears well without warning, and I wipe them away fast.

“Nyxa,” Maeve says gently, “you’ve been surviving for so long you forgot what it feels like to live. But that’s what this is: living, wanting, hoping. Even when it’s messy.”

I don’t respond. I can’t.

I’m not afraid of North walking away.

I’m terrified he won’t ask me to stay.

I try to play it cool. Smile like nothing’s wrong. Move through the kitchen like Maeve didn’t just crack something open inside me and leave it bleeding on the damn floor.

“What would your future look like… if you decided to leave?”

That’s what she asks like it's a simple exercise. Like she isn’t detonating something deep inside my chest.

I laugh it off at first. “I’m not going anywhere,” I tell her. Like I believe it.

But Maeve’s silence says otherwise.

Now, the house is too quiet. The kind of quiet that crawls under your skin and picks at old wounds.

What if North tells me I’m free?

The thought slams into me like a freight train, and I freeze, fingers tightening around the mug I haven’t even sipped from. My hands shake. I lie to myself, say it’s low blood sugar. But I know better.

The fear is there, loud and sharp and choking.

He’s never promised me forever. He’s never promised me anything. And I’ve been so damn happy pretending this was enough that I didn’t realize I was banking everything on a man who’s said more than once that love isn’t something in his book.

My pulse thunders in my ears. The kitchen tilts sideways and I set the mug down before I drop it. I grip the counter like it’s the only thing keeping me upright.

Maeve didn’t mean it like that. She was trying to help. Trying to make me think of my own future. She said it was healthy.

But it doesn’t feel healthy. It feels like betrayal.

To him. To me. To everything we’ve built between these walls.

I can’t imagine a future without him in it. I don’t want to.

But what if he does?

What if he looks me in the eye and says it’s time to go?

The thought is so vicious I lose my breath. My knees buckle, and I drop. My palms slap the cold floor and I curl forward, pressing my arms around my stomach, trying to hold myself together.

My chest heaves. I can’t catch my breath.

It’s like breathing through a straw, sharp, shallow, useless.