Declan let out a low breath that almost sounded like a laugh, but softer — the kind that lived deep in his chest. He shifted just enough to nuzzle his chin into her hair, his arm tightening around her shoulders like muscle memory.

“Darlin’,” he murmured, voice thick with sleep and the kind of affection that didn’t have an end to it, “you ain’t runnin’ behind on anything.”

His fingers kept their slow path along her arm, brushing warmth into her skin in steady, reassuring lines.

“You wake me up every mornin’ just by bein’ in my arms. Coffee don’t stand a chance against that.”

He pressed a kiss to the top of her head — slow, unhurried, the kind that lingered a second longer because he didn’t want to pull away.

Her palm was still warm against his chest, and he covered it with his own, tangling their fingers gently.

“And as for blamin’ me…” He tipped his head just enough to catch her eyes, a lazy grin tugging at the corner of his mouth. “I’ll take all of it. Happily.”

He shifted his legs under the blankets, adjusting her higher against him so she wouldn’t have to carry even her own weight.

“You don’t gotta move yet,” he added, voice dropping low and earnest. “Not ‘til your body says it’s ready. I’ve got you.”

His thumb glided slowly across the back of her hand, grounding her.

“And cinnamon rolls?” he drawled, smiling into her hair. “Sweetheart, you make those at noon, I’ll still brag to the whole damn station that my girl got up early to make me breakfast.”

He tucked the duvet a little higher around her shoulders, fussing without even realizing he was doing it.

“You rest,” he whispered, kissing her temple. “I’ll get the coffee started in a bit. You just stay right here with me ‘til you feel steady.”

He squeezed her hand once, gentle but sure.

“Lord knows I ain’t lettin’ you go anywhere yet.”

She should’ve argued.

Should’ve insisted that she was perfectly capable of making breakfast. That he’d done enough, always did too much, and it was her turn to take care of him for once. She even opened her mouth to say as much — but then his hand slid over hers, warm and strong, fingers curling in that grounding, careful way of his.

And suddenly, fighting him didn’t seem nearly as important as staying exactly where she was.

Hattie let her forehead rest against his collarbone with a quiet exhale, her lips brushing the bare skin there like a sigh. Her fingers, still tangled in his, slipped free only to begin a lazy path across his chest — soft, wandering little dances that traced over his sternum, his ribs, the curve of his shoulder.

She wasn’t trying to start anything.

Not right now, anyway.

She just… liked touching him. Especially like this. Especially when the world was still slow and sleepy, and she didn’t have to pretend she wasn’t in love with every part of him.

The darker side of him — that feral, hungry kind of love he showed her with his body — that was unforgettable. It lit her up in ways she hadn’t known were possible. But this part? The part where he fussed over her blankets and held her close like she might slip away in her sleep?

That was what broke her wide open.

That was what made her fall.

“You take such good care of me,” she whispered, her voice soft and a little scratchy with sleep. Her fingers stilled over his heart, pressing just slightly. “You always do. Even when I try to beat you to it.”

She lifted her head a little, just enough to see the sun beginning to spill in through the curtains — pale gold and peach, slipping across the wall and over the curve of Declan’s shoulder like it wanted to touch him too.

Her smile tugged quietly at the corners of her mouth.

“We don’t have to go anywhere today,” she murmured, eyes tracing the light on his skin. “And even if we did… I think I’d still pick this. You. Right here.”

She curled closer, her nose brushing under his jaw, her breath warm against his neck as her arm looped tighter around him.

“I think I’d pick this for a long, long time.”

Declan didn’t move at first.
Didn’t breathe too deeply.
Didn’t risk shifting the moment even a fraction.

He just held her — held her like she was something he was still learning how to believe he got to keep — and let her words soak into him slow.

Her fingers on his chest, soft and wandering like she was memorizing him all over again, made his heartbeat stumble and steady at the same time. Lord, she had no idea what she did to him when she touched him like that — not wanting anything, not asking for anything, just being with him.

He dipped his chin a little, his nose brushing lightly through her hair. His voice came out low, warm, and pulled straight from the center of his chest.

“Angel… you don’t even know what you do to me when you say things like that.”

His hand slid up her back, not rushed, not hungry — just slow and reverent, fingers mapping the curve of her spine in soft lines.

“You lettin’ me take care of you?” he murmured against her temple. “That’s a gift. Not somethin’ you gotta fight me on.”

He pressed a kiss into her hairline, lingering there.

“You think I don’t notice all the ways you take care of me?” he whispered, voice soft like morning fog. “Every little thing you do… every look, every touch… darlin’, I feel it. Down to the bone.”

She tightened her arm around him, nose brushing his throat, and he exhaled — slow, shaky in a way he’d never admit to anyone but her.

Her next words made his whole body go still.

I’d pick this for a long, long time.

Declan’s fingers curled in at her waist instinctively, pulling her that inch closer, like he needed her fully against him to trust he’d heard it right.

“Sweetheart…” His voice caught, the kind of break only she ever got to hear. “You say things like that and I swear I don’t know what to do with myself.”

He shifted just enough to see her face, brushing her hair back gently with the back of his fingers. His thumb traced along her cheek, featherlight, like he was scared of waking her even though she was wide awake.

“You pickin’ me?” he said quietly, earnestly. “Still? Even on mornings like this, when I’m half asleep and hoggin’ the covers and keepin’ you trapped here?”

His smile was soft and lopsided, eyes warm enough to melt her completely.

“Baby, I’ll spend the rest of my life tryin’ to be worthy of that.”

He kissed her forehead.
Then her cheek.
Then the corner of her mouth — slow, careful, like she was breakable and priceless all at once.

“And far as I’m concerned…” he whispered, settling her back against his chest, holding her perfectly where she wanted to be, “we don’t gotta go a damn place today.”

His thumb stroked slow circles on her back, coaxing her into the curve of him.

“’Cause I’d pick this too,” he added softly. “Every time. Every day. Long as you’ll let me.”

He tucked the duvet a little higher around her shoulders, protective without even thinking.

“You stay right here with me, Hattie Monroe,” he murmured into her hair. “Ain’t a better place in the world than this.”

She didn’t answer right away.

Not because she didn’t have the words — she did, all of them, crowding warm and steady in her chest — but because for a second, she just wanted to feel it.

The quiet of the room.
The sun on the wall.
His arms around her like he didn’t ever plan to let go.

Her fingers slid over his chest again — not teasing now, just present. She traced the curve of his collarbone, the faint rise and fall of his breathing. She pressed her lips to the base of his throat, soft as a promise.

Then, finally, she tipped her head back enough to meet his eyes.

“I do pick you,” she whispered, her voice like linen warmed by sunlight. “Every morning. Every night. Every time you make me laugh when I’m trying to be annoyed, or fold my laundry even though you don’t know where half of it goes.”

Her smile curved gently, her hand lifting to rest against his cheek.

“I pick you on the hard days. I pick you when you snore. I pick you when your hair sticks up in the back and you don’t know it. I pick you when you’re too stubborn to ask for help but still make sure I never go without it.”

She nudged her forehead against his, eyes soft but sure.

“And you don’t have to earn me, Declan. You never did. I used to think I wasn’t good enough for you — that I’d somehow gotten lucky and you’d figure it out one day.”

Her thumb swept across the edge of his jaw, slow and reverent.

“But I don’t feel that way anymore.”

She watched the way his expression shifted — that quiet vulnerability he only ever let her see. And her next words came out steadier than they ever had before.

“You are worthy. Just as you are. Even half-asleep and hogging the covers.”

She kissed the tip of his nose.

“You don’t have to prove anything to me. Not ever. I’m yours. I want to be yours. Forever and always.”

Her voice dipped to a softer hum as she laid her head back on his chest, her fingers threading gently through his.

“And if that means we don’t move a muscle all day?” she added, a quiet smile in her voice. “Well… I think the world can wait.”

Her hand rested over his heart again, feeling the way it beat just a little harder beneath her palm.

“You already give me everything I need.”

Declan felt her words hit him like a slow, quiet sunrise — not all at once, not blinding, but warm enough to break him open in the gentlest way a man could break.

He didn’t speak at first.

Couldn’t.

Not with her fingers tracing his collarbone like it was something sacred.
Not with her lips brushing his throat, sweet and certain.
Not with her voice saying forever and always like it was the easiest truth she’d ever given him.

His hand slid up her back, palm warm and steady, and he pulled her just a fraction closer — enough that she could feel the breath he exhaled against her temple.

“Lord, honey…” he murmured, voice low and rough in that way it only got when he was feeling too much. “You’re gonna put me in the ground talkin’ like that.”

He tilted her chin up with two fingers, gentle as sunrise, needing her eyes on him. His thumb brushed her cheekbone — slow, tracing the warmth there like he could memorize the moment by touch alone.

“You think you ain’t good enough?” he whispered, brow bending just slightly. “Hattie, you’re the best damn thing that’s ever happened to me.”

He said it simply. Plainly. Like it wasn’t even up for debate.

His knuckles grazed the line of her jaw before he bent to press a kiss to her forehead — firm and lingering, the kind a man gives when he’s not planning on going anywhere.

“You’re the one who made this place feel like a home the second you walked through the door,” he went on softly. “You’re the reason I sleep easy. The reason I wake up smilin’. The reason I wanna be a better man every single day.”

His hand found hers again, fingers threading tight, like letting go wasn’t an option.

“And as far as earnin’ you?” He shook his head, eyes softening the way they only did for her. “You just bein’ here… you reachin’ for me in the middle of the night… you sayin’ my name in that soft little voice… that’s more than I ever thought I’d deserve.”

He kissed her then — slow and tender, nothing rushed, just lips to lips, warm and sure, the kind of kiss that said I’m yours without needing any words.

When he pulled back, he rested his forehead against hers, nose brushing hers in a lazy, morning-soft way.

“You’re my always too, sweetheart,” he whispered. “Ain’t a doubt in my damn mind.”

She settled back against his chest, and he wrapped both arms around her, tucking her in as if the world outside didn’t exist. His thumb stroked the back of her hand in absent, loving circles.

And when she said the world could wait?

Declan smiled, low and boyish, one of those rare real smiles he only ever gave her.

“Good,” he hummed, pressing a kiss into her hair. “’Cause I’m not lettin’ you outta this bed ’til you want me to.”

He shifted just enough to kiss the top of her head, slow and soft.

“Far as I’m concerned?” he murmured against her hair, his heartbeat steady beneath her palm.
“This right here — you in my arms, this quiet, this mornin’ — this is all I need too.”

He held her a little tighter, warm and settled and entirely hers.

“And, Hattie?” he added, voice soft as honey. “Forever don’t sound near long enough.”

Hattie didn’t move at first.

Didn’t speak either.

Not when his arms folded tighter around her like he was afraid she might vanish.
Not when his voice — thick and trembling at the edges — wrapped around her like a second blanket.
Not when his kiss landed on her forehead with the weight of everything he hadn’t said before now.

She just breathed.

In the steady rhythm of his heartbeat.
In the warmth of the duvet.
In the way his words unraveled her without breaking her apart.

It didn’t matter that the world was already awake outside the window. That the sun had crept past the curtains and spilled gold across the sheets. That time was moving.

Because here, in his arms, it didn’t move.
It paused.
Held its breath.
Let them belong.

Her fingers curled lightly at his chest, drawing soft, absent circles above his heart. Her cheek rested against his skin, her body nestled fully into the cradle of his. And for a while, she just let the silence hum.

Until the words in her throat got too warm to hold any longer.

“You make it so easy to love you,” she whispered, voice quiet but steady — the kind of steady that came from knowing, not hoping. “Even when I was scared. Even when I didn’t think I’d ever have something like this.”

She kissed the center of his chest, right over that heart he didn’t guard when it came to her.

“And I don’t need forever to decide,” she added, softer now. “I already have.”

Her hand slid up to cup his jaw, her thumb brushing the stubble there with the kind of reverence that only came after choosing someone completely. After staying.

“I’m not going anywhere, Declan Caldwell.”

She smiled, faint and full, eyes shining in the early light.

“Not now. Not later. Not ever.”

Her lips found his again — slow, adoring, lingering just because she could. Because she wanted to. And when she pulled back, she tucked herself right back into his arms, content to live there a little longer.

The coffee could wait.
The world could wait.
Because this — this soft, morning-slow kind of love — this was what home felt like.

[let's end here. I'll start a new scene soon]

The house felt too quiet without him.

Their house.

She let the key ring drop into the ceramic bowl by the door, toeing off her shoes while keeping her jacket on just a moment longer — the place held a chill that only ever settled in when he wasn’t home yet. She walked into the kitchen, thumb tracing the rim of the mug she’d left drying on the counter that morning, the one he always reached for second, right after his plain black one.

He was still out on a call when she left the station.
A bad one, judging by the clipped radio chatter.

She tried not to dwell on it.

Instead, she moved around their little rental, turning on soft lamps, lighting the candle he liked in the living room, opening the curtains a bit so the last stretch of late‑December evening could paint the walls in blue and gold. She folded the blanket on the couch. Straightened the coasters. Checked the time.

He should’ve been home by now.

Her stomach fluttered — not worried yet, just… ready.
She missed him today.

When the sound of his truck finally crackled into the driveway, her whole body loosened. A smile tugged at her mouth before she even reached the hallway. She brushed her hair behind her ear, smoothing her shirt automatically.

He was home.

But the moment the front door opened, something inside her went still.

He stepped inside with a weight she felt before she saw it — shoulders tight beneath his jacket, jaw set hard, hands trembling just enough that only she would notice. He didn’t look up right away. Didn’t kiss her hello or pull her into his chest like he always did.

He shut the door too quickly.
Too forcefully.
Not like him.

Her heartbeat fluttered — soft, confused, a little anxious.

Did I do something? Did I say something wrong earlier? Did I… miss a cue?

She stepped forward, slow, gentle.

“Hey, you’re—”

He moved past her.

Not violently. Not harshly.
But brushed by her like he hadn’t even realized he’d done it.

Her breath stumbled.

That tiny contact — the absence of softness where it always lived — felt sharp.

She turned to watch him shrug out of his jacket. His movements were clipped, jerky, unthinking. His boots hit the floor by the door with more force than usual. When he went to hang his jacket, the hook rattled on the wall.

He didn’t look at her.

That’s when her worry shifted — from Did I do something wrong? to something heavier, darker.

Something happened.

He raked a hand through his hair — not the slow, tired gestures she was used to after a long shift, but a rough drag, fingers curling tight at the back of his neck like he didn’t know what to do with his hands.

Her chest tightened.

He was snapping — not at her, but around her, inside himself.
Quiet cracks in the air.

No words.
No anger.
Just a trembling tension that didn’t have anywhere to go.

She took one small, careful step forward.

“…Decl—”

He flinched.

Not away from her — away from the sound of her voice.

That was worse.

Her breath caught in her throat. Her fingers curled against her palms as she watched his shoulders lift and fall in a hard, uneven breath. He braced both hands against the edge of the kitchen counter, head bowed, back rising and falling too fast.

Something was wrong.
Really wrong.

And it wasn’t her.

She knew that now.

Hattie softened her stance, swallowed gently, and took another step into the quiet storm of him — slow, steady, careful not to crowd the tremble in his hands or the tightness in his shoulders.

Her voice dropped into something barely above a whisper, tender and brave all at once.

“…You’re home,” she said, not touching him yet.
“Come back to me when you can. I’m right here.”

She didn’t push.
Didn’t question.
Didn’t reach for him yet.

She just stayed.

Close enough that he could find her when the shaking stopped.

Declan didn’t hear her words at first.

He felt them — a soft thread of sound that reached him through the noise still roaring in his head — but they didn’t land, not the way they should’ve. His hands were still braced against the counter, knuckles white, breath sawing sharp and uneven as he tried to get oxygen into a chest that refused to expand.

Smoke.
Screaming.
Frozen air.
The weight of someone going limp in his hands.

He squeezed his eyes shut.

He’d gotten one out.
He hadn’t gotten the other.

His jaw clenched until something ached. His fingers curled hard against the counter edge.

He knew he should turn around.
Knew it was her behind him.
Knew she was worried — hell, he could feel it, could feel the soft patience she carried like a second skin.

But if he looked at her too soon, if he saw her eyes — steady, gentle, full of the kind of love he still didn’t know how to deserve — he was going to break apart right there on the damn kitchen floor.

Her voice came again, softer, steadying, giving him permission without touching him.

You’re home.
Come back to me when you can.
I’m right here.

He heard that one.

Declan’s breath hitched — a quiet, fractured sound he couldn’t swallow down fast enough. His shoulders jerked once, the tension in them pulling tight like a rubber band about to snap. He dragged one hand off the counter and pressed the heel of it hard against his brow, trying to quiet the pounding inside his skull.

But then she took one more step — not close enough to touch, but close enough that he could feel her, warm and patient behind him.

His whole body reacted.

A tremor went through him, sharp and visible.

He didn’t turn around. Not yet. His voice came out rough, low, dragged from somewhere he didn’t let people hear.

“Hattie… don’t.”

Not don’t be here.

Not don’t speak.

Don’t be gentle.
Don’t make this real.
Don’t let me fall apart in front of you.

Another breath — broken in the middle.

He shook his head once, jaw tight, eyes burning.

“I can’t—” His voice cracked, the words tearing on the way out. “Jesus, I… I can’t talk about it yet.”

His fingers curled against his thigh, hand shaking despite how tightly he tried to hold it still.

He wasn’t angry at her.
He wasn’t angry at anyone.

He was drowning in the sick, choking guilt of I should’ve done more.
The kind that sank into bone.

Declan forced another breath, but it stuttered, and that was what finally made him turn — slowly, like it weighed a hundred pounds.

When he saw her, standing there exactly where he’d left her, eyes soft and steady and brave… something inside him nearly buckled.

He swallowed hard, chest rising and falling too quickly.

His voice was barely a whisper.

“…I lost someone today.”

He didn’t give details. Didn’t need to. His eyes carried all of it — the helplessness, the failure he couldn’t shake, the desperate, furious grief he’d been holding together by threads.

He scrubbed a hand over his face, breath shaking again.

“I tried, Hattie. I swear to God I tried.”

He wasn’t crying.

Not exactly.

But he was close — and he hated it, hated the way it made him feel raw and exposed and unworthy of the way she was looking at him.

His voice dropped to something hoarse, broken at the edges.

“Please… don’t come closer yet. Just… just give me a second.”

Even as he said it, his fingers twitched toward her — a subconscious reach he didn’t mean to make, didn’t know he made.

The part of him that needed space was losing the fight against the part of him that needed her.

She didn’t move.
Didn’t breathe too loudly.
Didn’t blink too fast, like even that might startle the fragile balance between the pain in his eyes and the way he was barely holding it all in.

She just stood there.
Still.
Quiet.
Watching him.

Her heart ached at the way his shoulders rose and fell too fast, the way his fingers clenched like they were trying to grip something that wasn’t there. The way he wouldn’t — couldn’t — quite look at her.

Declan was the strongest person she’d ever known.
Steady. Capable. Brave to a fault.
He carried everyone else’s weight without ever complaining. He carried her, on the days she didn’t know how to stand.

And now he was standing in their kitchen, looking like the world had torn something out of him and left the rest barely upright.

When he turned — finally — she saw it.

Not the version of him everyone else knew.
The one only she ever got to see.

His face was pale under the stubble, his eyes red-rimmed and swimming in something he didn’t know how to let fall. His voice cracked like it had splintered around the words before they ever reached his mouth.

"I lost someone today.”
“I tried, Hattie. I swear to God I tried.”
“Please… don’t come closer yet. Just… just give me a second.”



She nodded. Soft. Barely perceptible.
Her throat was tight, but she didn’t speak.

She could give him a second.
She would.

So she stayed exactly where she was — a few feet away, hands at her sides, chest tight with the ache of watching him suffer and not being able to fix it.

But as the silence stretched, and his voice faded, and his body started to fold in on itself again —
Her own heart broke a little more.

His fingers twitched.
Just a small, aching flick of movement.

It was enough.

Her steps were slow. Barefoot. Quiet against the kitchen floor.
No rush. No noise.

Just closeness.

She didn’t throw her arms around him.
Didn’t kiss the pain away.
Didn’t ask questions he wasn’t ready to answer.

She just reached for one of his hands — the one still clenched tight — and wrapped her smaller fingers gently around it.

He flinched.

Not away. Just… reacted.
Like touch wasn’t something he thought he deserved right now.

But he didn’t let go.

She stepped in closer, until her chest was just shy of his, until she could feel the heat of him — shaking, raw, but real. She raised her other hand and rested it, feather-light, against the center of his chest.

“I know,” she whispered, finally. “I know you did.”

His breath caught.

Her eyes filled with tears, but she blinked them back — not for herself. For him. He needed someone steady right now. He needed her steady.

“You don’t have to tell me anything else,” she murmured, soft as wind through leaves. “You don’t have to say another word.”

She brought his hand slowly up between them and pressed her lips to the back of it. Just once. Tender. Certain.

“But I’m not gonna let you carry all that alone.”

He swayed just slightly — a half inch forward, like gravity was finally winning. Like she was the gravity.

Her voice stayed gentle. Assured.
The kind she only used for him.

“You’re the strong one, Declan. Every day.” Her thumb brushed over his knuckles. “But I can be strong too. I can hold you. I want to hold you.”

Still no tears from him.
But his hand gripped hers a little tighter.

She stepped the rest of the way in and laid her head gently against his chest — against the place where his heart beat hard and fast and hurting.

Her arms wrapped carefully around his waist.
Not clinging. Not crushing. Just there.

“I’ve got you,” she whispered. “I’m right here.”

She felt him exhale then.
Not cleanly. Not fully.
But enough that she knew —
he believed her.

Declan didn’t know the exact moment his body decided to give up pretending he was fine.

Maybe it was when her fingers folded around his — small, warm, steady in a way that made the ground under him feel less like it was tilting.
Maybe it was when she pressed her forehead to his chest, right against the heartbeat he’d been trying to outrun since the call.
Or maybe it was when she said I can be strong too with that quiet certainty that went straight through every wall he’d ever built.

But something in him loosened.

Something in him broke.

Not the loud kind of break.
The soft, devastating kind — the kind that happens when someone finally reaches the part of you that’s been bleeding silently for hours.

His fingers tightened around hers — no, gripped — not out of anger, not out of panic, but like she was the only thing keeping him upright. His head dipped forward, chin barely brushing the crown of her hair.

He breathed in.

It shuddered through him.

Then another breath — worse, uneven, like his ribs didn’t know how to expand without shaking.

“Hattie…” he whispered, and her name cracked clean down the middle.

He didn’t pull away.
He didn’t step back.
He didn’t try to pretend.

He leaned.

Just enough that his forehead brushed the top of her head, his weight shifting toward her in a way that said more than any words he could form right now.

His free hand — the one still trembling faintly — lifted like he wasn’t sure what to do with it. But instinct won over shame; he rested it between her shoulder blades, fingers splaying wide, careful even in his unraveling.

Her arms around his waist steadied him more than she could possibly know.

“I—” The word broke off. He swallowed, hard, jaw working. His eyes squeezed shut like he was trying to hold the image of the call away, to keep it from swallowing him whole.

“You don’t… you don’t know how bad it was.”

His voice was rough, but quieter than before. Less snapping. Less bracing. It was the sound of a man who’d been strong for too long and finally met the one person he trusted enough to crumble near.

He shifted just a little, enough that his cheek came to rest on the top of her head, breath warm against her hair. His arm tightened around her, pulling her fully against him.

Her scent — soft, familiar, like home after a storm — hit him so hard his chest shook.

“You shouldn’t have to see me like this,” he murmured, barely audible. “I’m supposed to… I don’t know. Keep it together. Be the one who makes things okay.”

Another breath. Shaky, broken in the middle.

“You come home wantin’ warmth and dinner and some stupid movie, and instead you get—”

His voice failed.

It didn’t fade.
It crumbled.

His fingers fisted gently in the back of her shirt, like the only thing left he trusted to hold onto was her.

“I tried,” he whispered again, but now his voice sounded young, raw, like a confession finally tearing through the surface. “God, Hattie… I tried so hard.”

A quiet, helpless tremor rippled through him — the kind that wasn’t a sob yet, but was close, too close.

And when she held him tighter?

He broke the last inch.

His breath hitched, sharp and painful, and he let his weight rest fully in her arms — not collapsing, not buckling, but surrendering the part of him he never let anyone see.

She felt him exhale a shudder into her shoulder, felt the way his grip shifted from desperation to need.

“Hattie…” His voice trembled. “Please don’t let go.”

He didn’t have to ask.

She wouldn’t.

Not now.
Not ever.