Page 62 of Scars of Silk

I’m in bed when there’s a knock on the door. Are you kidding? I haven’t slept a wink at the hospital and only left when a nurse who said I’d be better off with some sleep under my belt shoe-horned me out of the chair and marched me for the exit.

She knows nothing about me and my family.

Nothing about the truth that lurks in a cupboard, skeletons that dance to their own tune.

But her words meant something. I won’t be able to fight for us. For mum and me. Not if I’m knackered. And this is a fight. It’s a brawl for survival.

I’m expecting Elijah. Melissa would have tipped him off like she always does when things gets bad and he’ll stand there on my doorstep with a bottle of hideously expensive whisky which we will drink in silence while he tells me to get free, to get away.

It’s not Elijah.

“What are you doing here?”

Dan’s leant against the hallway door. “I'm on my way to Ibiza. Thought I’d make a pit stop on the way?”

A giggle escapes through my lips, although it’s heavy on the nervous side. “What? Ibiza?”

He steps up and my breath catches in my throat as his hands slide around my waist, slipping into the grooves I want only him to know.

When his mouth lands on mine, it’s like my heart will explode. It grows, wider and fuller until it could fill every inch of space in my chest. “Is this a booty call pit stop?” I mumble against his lips.

“Not quite.”

He drags me closer as he steps across the threshold into the tiny flat I merely exist in. With every step he brings me to life. My hands are in his hair, against his jacket, pulling at the material separating us.

I never expected to see him again.

It was meant to be fun; but now he’s here and I can taste him, I know it’s so much more.

In his grasp I can sense my salvation and it comes in the shape of wide muscles and patterns of ink.

I break our kiss, staring into his eyes, my breath ragged, my chest pushing against his. In his gaze I see myself. Us.

“I think I love you,” I can’t not say it. I can’t not tell him how I feel. I fight against the restraints of my upbringing, against the silence and the secrets and I lay my truths out for him to hear.

His kiss when it comes back onto my mouth is harder, firmer, and that’s all the response I need to know he feels the same.

“So really, Ibiza?”

I’m against his chest. His lips are pressed into my hair, sporadically kissing as his fingers trail along the skin of my back. “That’s up to you.”

“Up to me how?”

“I spoke to one of my dad’s old friends. He has shops all over the place. I explained I needed a change, a chance to sort myself out, so he offered me management at his Ibiza shop. His old manager just walked away, and while he wasn’t in a hurry to fill the place, what with it being out of season, he said it was mine if I wanted it.”

My heart sinks at his words.

“I wanted to ask if you’d come?”

I lift to meet his gaze. Seeing him here in my bedroom feels like it should have happened every day of forever, as though he’s always existed in this place, with his lazy smile and swirls and patterns.

“That’s a big ask.”

“But you love me. You said it; you can’t take it back.”

I giggle like a schoolgirl. “I did.”

His eyebrow arches. “So?”