Page 115 of Cross Ice

I looked at him and didn’t say no immediately, which was new.

“I know you said no before. But this—” He gestured toward the laptop. “This is exactly what he warned about. He knows what the first month looks like. He knows how to handle the blog posts, the recognition, the routine documentation. He’s been through it.”

“With people who chose this life. I didn’t choose it. That’s a different problem.”

“Maybe that’s exactly why you should talk to him.” His voice was careful now, not pushing. “Not to manage a public image. To figure out how to protect what’s left of your privacy.”

I knew Wesley wasn’t Ryan’s team. I’d known that since Nico met with him in Portland. Knowing it and feeling it were still two different things. “Let me think about it.” It wasn’t yes, but it wasn’t the flat no it had been before.

Nico nodded. Didn’t push further.

“Then what do you need right now?” he asked. “Not a plan. Just… what do you need tonight?”

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “I just need you to understand that this isn’t fixable. There’s no strategy that makes it okay for a website to publish where I live. There’s no plan that stops people from recognizing me in public.”

“I know.” The frustration was still there, underneath, but he was holding it. “I know that. I just…” He blew out a breath. “I hate that I can’t fix it.”

“I know you do.”

We sat there in the heavy silence of a conversation neither of us knew how to finish.

He reached for me, and I let him pull me close. His arms wrapped around me, solid and steady, and for a minute I could breathe again.

This was what I’d been holding onto. This feeling, that even when everything else was impossible, Nico’s presence still made it more bearable. The way he could stand in the middle of my collapsing world and not flinch.

“I’m sorry this is happening to you,” he said against my hair.

“It’s not your fault.”

“Feels like it is.”

We stayed like that for a long time. When he finally pulled back, I could see the exhaustion on his face. The strain of trying to hold both of us together while everything fell apart.

He kissed me, slow and careful, and what I felt was evidence. That he was still here. That this was still real.

I kissed him back and tried to believe it.

He left around ten to get some sleep, and I walked him to the door. He hesitated before leaving.

“Text me tomorrow?” he said.

“Yeah.”

“And Evan? If anything else happens—if you see anyone following you, if another article comes out—tell me immediately. Don’t wait.”

“I will.”

He kissed me one more time and left, and I stood in my doorway watching him walk down the hall. The set of his shoulders, the way he rolled his neck once before he entered the elevator… small things, but I knew what they meant.

He was trying so hard—showing up, offering solutions, staying even when I made it difficult.

That had to count for something.

I just didn’t know if it counted for enough.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Nico