Craig looked away, his composure slipping, breath catching somewhere between anger and ache. He bit his lip, exhaling hard, as if one more word from her would undo him completely.
Merlina saw it. The small, human fracture in him. The place her name still lived.
"Yeah, I stayed away," she murmured, eyes glistening with everything she'd never said. "But every night I'd lie in the dark and let the quiet hold me the way you used to…the way you'd whisper my name. I'd close my eyes and feel you there, breathing with me, loving me even when I couldn't love myself."
Her fingers curled in midair, aching to touch him but stopping short. "I missed the way you looked at me, I missed falling asleep to the sound of your voice in my head, telling me I was safe, when you flew me out of college, just so I could breathe easy. I missed—"
