Benji blinked up at her, lashes still heavy with sleep, but his grin kicked in fast—lazy, crooked, dangerously fond.

He didn’t even try to hide it.

Because damn, there she was. Full force. No armor, no filters, just Heather in all her wildfire glory, straddling his lap like she’d just declared war and invited him to lose.

And yeah. He’d lose to her a thousand times and never complain.

His hands found her hips without hesitation, thumbs brushing the hem of her skirt with a kind of reverence disguised as casual touch. Like he knew she could bolt any second and was just trying to memorize what it felt like to have her this close.

At her line—do I get breakfast before or after you pretend not to be obsessed with me?—he let out a slow, wrecked kind of laugh.

“Oh, sweetheart,” he rasped, voice still dipped in gravel and sunrise. “You think I’ve been pretending?”

He leaned in, mouth brushing just below her jaw, teasing, reverent, dangerous in the way only honesty could be.

“I’ve been obsessed since the first time you threatened to kick my ass in those boots.”

One hand slid up her spine, warm and grounding.

“And for the record? Breakfast is happening after.”

His teeth grazed her neck, not enough to mark—yet—but enough to make a promise. Then he pulled back just enough to meet her eyes, that storm-light gaze of hers drawing every truth out of him whether he meant to say it or not.

“No pretending. Not with you.”

A beat.

“Besides,” he added, smirking just a little, “you’re not ruining your reputation. You’re rewriting it.”

Then, with a look that belonged to no one else but her—

“You staying or not, Goodwin?”

He already knew the answer.
But damn, he loved watching her say it with fire in her eyes.

Heather’s breath hitched.

Not dramatically. Not in some girlish gasp of surprise. Just quietly—internally—like her heart had shifted its weight to one side and left her unbalanced in the best, most terrifying way.

Because this wasn’t a game anymore.

Wasn’t some temporary rebellion against Sunnyvale. Wasn’t a fling meant to distract her from the curse that still pulsed beneath her skin like a bruise that never healed.

This was real.

Benji—half-asleep, grinning like a man who’d already decided to love her even if it killed him—wasn’t a detour. He was the goddamn fork in the road. And she’d stepped off the path, heels first.

She’d have to tell him eventually.

About her last name. About the bloodline. About the way her dreams had been changing—getting louder, darker, closer. About how sometimes she wondered if the curse wasn’t just calling to her… but through her.

Because nothing about this would stay simple. Not for long.

And yet, here he was.

Palms warm on her hips. Eyes soft, reverent, infuriatingly unafraid. Touching her like he didn’t need the truth to choose her. Like he already had.

Her heart rebelled—demanding a different future than the one she’d been bred for. Demanding him.

She tilted her head just slightly, lips brushing the shell of his ear, voice low and lethal and soaked in velvet.

“Wouldn’t be much of a reputation rewrite if I bailed now, would it?”

A pause. Then, slow and deliberate, her hand slid up under his shirt—fingertips brushing the bare skin of his stomach, tracing just beneath his ribs with a softness that belied the fire behind her eyes. Before retreating. Not yet.

“Besides…” Her smile curved slow and sharp, all heat and wickedness. “If you think one neck graze and a gravel-voiced compliment gets you that kind of breakfast…”

She leaned in like she was offering something precious—only to veer left at the last second, pressing a kiss just below his mouth. Not a surrender. A challenge.

Kisses came from cheap dates.
But this? Rewriting her whole life?

That cost more.

She pulled back, hair falling like fire over her shoulder, pulse steady and alive with certainty.

“I’m staying, Benji.”

Her voice was velvet over steel. A promise she wasn’t afraid to keep.

God help us both.

Benji watched her—hair wild, lips smug, eyes lit with something dangerous and divine—and for a second, he just let himself have it. The moment. The girl. The gravity of knowing she’d said yes to him. To this.

Then he leaned forward, slow and deliberate, lips brushing the line of her jaw in a touch that wasn’t about seduction—it was about having her here. Alive. Real. Chosen.

“Alright, reputation-wrecker,” he murmured, voice low and thick with sleep and something deeper. “Back to bed.”

He shifted, arms sliding around her waist as he stood—lifting her with practiced ease and a grin that said you’re not getting away now, so don’t bother trying. She squeaked, but he didn’t give her time to protest. He just carried her the three short steps to the bed tucked behind the curtain that barely separated it from the rest of the trailer.

Benji dropped her gently onto the mattress, the worn flannel sheets rumpled and warm from the night before. He climbed in right after her, pulling the quilt over both of them in one smooth tug.

Then he wrapped himself around her. No hesitation. No asking.

One arm slung around her middle, his hand finding its home beneath the hem of her shirt, palm warm against bare skin. His other arm cradled her head, pulling her against his chest like he couldn’t bear a single inch between them.

“See?” he whispered against her hair. “Much better.”

He kissed the crown of her head, soft and slow, like a secret he wasn’t ready to say out loud yet.

And then, lips still against her temple:

“You stay right here, Goodwin. Just for a little longer.”

A beat.

“Forever’s negotiable.”

She should have protested.

Should’ve groaned dramatically about needing food. Or complained that she was supposed to be the one in control here. Or at the very least, pointed out that lifting her like that without warning was grounds for a full-on glitter-fueled vendetta.

But instead?

All that came out was a soft gasp—the kind she hated giving anyone—and then a startled laugh as he carried her like she weighed nothing. Like this was normal. Like she did this all the time: got swept up and tucked away like something precious instead of something sharp.

And God help her… she loved it.

Not just the way his arms fit around her. Not just the way he moved like her body had already mapped itself onto his.

But the way he didn’t hesitate.

No second-guessing. No posturing. Just action. Just care.

The flannel sheets hit her back with a sigh, and before she could make a joke about his decorating skills—or lack thereof—he was climbing in beside her, that damn quilt pulled over them like a cocoon.

And then he was everywhere.

Arms wrapped tight. Chest solid against her spine. One hand splayed under her shirt like it belonged there—like he didn’t care about the curses or the consequences, just her heartbeat under his palm.

Heather let herself melt.

Only a little. Just enough to let her head fall back against his shoulder, her legs curling instinctively toward his.

She could still make fun of him later. Still claw her way back to control with a well-placed jab or an outrageous demand.

But right now?

She didn’t want control.

She just wanted this.

His voice drifted over her, rough and warm against her scalp.

You stay right here, Goodwin. Just for a little longer.
Forever’s negotiable.

She rolled her eyes, just barely, a smirk tugging at her lips.

“If this is your idea of negotiation,” she whispered, voice drowsy and full of fond warning, “you should know I’m not above biting.”

Then, with a slow twist of her body, she turned to face him.

Their legs tangled. Her hand slipped up to rest lightly on his chest, her thumb brushing against the curve of his collarbone. Her eyes—still shadowed with sleep but alive with mischief—locked onto his with that same fire she always wielded like a blade.

“But if you keep looking at me like that,” she added, voice lower now, silkier, “I might forget I’m supposed to make you work for it.”

A beat passed. Her smirk softened at the edges—still dangerous, still her, but kissed with something warm and wrecking.

This wasn’t surrender.

It was choice.

And for the first time in her life… she wanted to stay exactly where she was.

The floor was cold beneath her feet.
Not trailer-floor cold—concrete. Earth.
Damp like it remembered something.

The night was still.

But inside her head, it was screaming.

Whispers like rusted chains. Echoes too close to be echoes. And that name—his name—scraping along the inside of her skull like a knife being dragged across stone.

Tommy. Tommy. Tommy Slater.

She didn’t mean to say it. Didn’t feel her lips move.

But the name left her anyway, over and over, a slow murmur falling from her mouth like a prayer turned inside out.

Tommy. Tommy. Tommy Slater.

She was standing in the woods.

She thought.

Or maybe it was behind the trailer. Maybe it didn’t matter.

There were trees.

Or shadows.

Or maybe just the memory of both.

She couldn’t feel her hands.

She couldn’t remember how she got there.

There was dirt under her nails, cold air in her lungs, and something humming beneath her skin like blood caught in barbed wire.

She wasn’t dreaming.

She was inside the dream.

But she was awake.

Sort of.

And Tommy’s name kept spilling from her mouth.

Like it had nowhere else to go.

Tommy. Tommy Slater. Tommy Slater.

Until—

“Heather?”

A voice, sharp and human, cut through the night.

Real.

Benji.

She blinked.

The trees didn’t vanish. The dark didn’t fade. But the pull in her spine loosened just enough for her to shiver.

She turned—slow, like her bones weren’t fully hers—and there he was, barefoot on the porch, sweatpants and sleep still clinging to him, fear carved across his face like a new kind of scar.

She looked down.

Her feet were covered in dirt.

She didn’t know when she’d left the trailer.

Didn’t know how long she’d been gone.

Her lips were still moving when he reached her.

The name—Tommy—still hovering on her breath like fog.

And suddenly, she was freezing.

And she couldn’t breathe.

And she wasn’t sure who she was anymore.

Benji was running before he even realized it.

Bare feet slapping against the wood of the trailer steps, heart in his throat, dread boiling beneath his ribs like it had been waiting for this moment.

Heather’s voice had dragged him out of sleep—barely a voice, really. Just a whisper. A repetition. A chant. Over and over again.

Tommy Slater. Tommy Slater.

By the time he made it outside, the night had swallowed her.

And then—there she was.

Standing barefoot in the dirt like something had pulled her out of herself and left her body behind. Her lips moving. Her eyes unfocused. Her whole body still except for the way her fingers twitched like they were remembering how to dig.

“Heather,” he breathed again, softer this time.

He didn’t reach for her right away. Didn’t touch her. Just stepped into her space, close enough that the heat from his skin might pull her back.

“Hey,” he murmured, voice low, coaxing. “It’s me. You’re okay. You’re here.”

But she didn’t look okay.

She looked haunted.

Her eyes were glassed over, her breath coming too fast, like her lungs didn’t believe the air was real. And that name—that fucking name—still hung on her lips like it was stitched there.

Benji’s throat tightened.

He took a breath. Stepped in.

Slow.

“Look at me, Heather.”

He cupped her face, gentle but firm, tilting it until their foreheads touched, grounding her in the only way he knew how.

“Come back.”

He closed his eyes, pressed his voice into her like a tether.

“You’re not in the woods. You’re not in a dream. You’re here. With me.”

His thumb brushed over her cheek, her jaw, the corner of her mouth—chasing the name away like he could wipe it from her lips before it sank any deeper.

“You’re Heather Goodwin, and you’re stronger than whatever this is. Whatever it’s trying to do to you.”

A beat. His voice cracked just slightly.

“And I’m not letting it take you.”

He felt her shiver then—just the smallest tremor, but hers. Real.

And that was all he needed.

Without waiting for permission, Benji wrapped his arms around her, pulling her against his chest like she might disappear if he let go. His palm pressed flat against her spine. His heartbeat, frantic, matched hers beat for beat.

“I’ve got you,” he whispered, burying his face in her hair.

“I’ve got you.”

And he wouldn’t let go.

Not tonight.
Not ever.

She was in two places at once.

One foot in the clearing behind Benji’s trailer.

One foot somewhere else—older, darker.

Somewhere that smelled like rust and rot and wet earth packed tight over shallow graves.

She didn’t hear him at first.

Not really.

Not Benji. Not her name.

What she heard was the thud of footsteps through pine needles and underbrush.

Fast.

Frantic.

Running.

She heard breathing—ragged, desperate.

She turned toward the sound.

Saw them.

Two shadows bolting through the trees. One tall. One smaller. Familiar shapes—but she didn’t know them, not here. Not now.

Behind them—

Tommy.

A flash of a burlap sack. The glint of a blade.

He was swinging with purpose. Rhythm. Joy.

And she felt it.

Felt it like it was her own arm cutting through the dark.

The way the axe wanted bone.

The way it sang when it struck.

She staggered back.

No—not back. Not her body.

Her mind. Her self. Whatever was left.

She was inside him. With him. Of him.

And she could feel the others, too.

Ruby’s laughter like glass breaking.

Ryan Torres’s teeth grinding in time with a pulse that wasn’t hers.

Billy Barker dragging his bat behind her skull like an echo.

She was tethered to them.

Tied in.

A part of the hive.

No.

She tried to scream, but her mouth only gave breath to Tommy’s name again.

She was slipping.

Falling.

Being shaped.

And then—

Warmth.

Hands.

Her name.

Not in the woods. Not in the dream.

“Come back,” Benji whispered, close enough to anchor her.

His forehead touched hers. His hands cradled her face like she was something breakable—something worth saving.

Her lips twitched.

She felt the curse pull—a final tug like a leash snapping taut.

But she clung to the sound of his voice.

To his heartbeat.

To the pressure of his arms wrapping around her like he could hold back hell.

And somehow—

Somehow, she blinked.

She breathed.

And when she opened her mouth again, the name that came out wasn’t Tommy.

It was his.

“Benji…”

Her voice was shredded. Not a whisper. A wound.

But it was hers.

She blinked again. Realized her cheek was pressed to his chest, his shirt damp against her skin. Her fingers curled tight in the fabric.

Her legs felt numb.

Her mouth was dry.

“I, um…”

She tried to laugh.

It came out wrong.

“I think I just sleepwalked into a slasher flick. Five stars. Would not recommend.”

Benji didn’t laugh.

Neither did she.

Because she was still shaking.

And the truth was still there—quiet and horrible beneath the joke.

This is happening.

It’s getting worse.

And next time, you might not come back.

But for now—

For tonight—

She was in his arms.

And she was still herself.

Barely.

Benji held her like he was afraid to breathe wrong.

Like if he let go—even for a second—she’d slip back through his fingers and into the dark she’d just clawed her way out of.

Her voice—his name—shattered something in him. Not because it was broken. But because it wasn’t. Because it made it back. Because she made it back.

“Hey,” he said softly, breath stalling against her hair. “Hey, I got you.”

His hands moved—slow, steady—one curling around the back of her neck, the other flattening over her spine again like he could press her soul back into place.

She was freezing.

She was shaking.

But she was here.

And God, the sound of her trying to joke, trying to be Heather through the rubble of that nightmare?

It undid him.

He didn’t smile. Didn’t call her dramatic. Didn’t say it was just a dream, because it wasn’t.

He knew.

And it wasn’t just the dirt on her feet or the way her fingers clutched his shirt like a lifeline.

It was the look in her eyes.

That deep, awful knowing that something had tried to pull her into it. Not as a victim.

As a vessel.

Benji pulled back just enough to see her face, thumbs brushing the hollow beneath her cheekbones, gentle like he was scared she might flinch.

“You’re not alone in this,” he said, voice low but certain.

“You feel them? Fine. Fuck ’em. Let them rattle in the corners. Let them scream. You look at me.”

He leaned in, forehead to hers again, grounding.

“You’re not theirs.”

A pause. His breath caught.

“You’re mine.”

He didn’t mean it possessive. He meant it true.

Then softer, more broken, more Benji:

“And I don’t care if I have to sit on this porch every goddamn night with salt lines and baseball bats and a flashlight in my teeth—I’m not letting them take you.”

He swallowed hard, emotion catching in his throat before he forced it down.

“You hear me, Goode girl? They don’t get you.”

A beat.

“I do.”

Then he scooped her up—gently, carefully—because she was still shaking and her legs looked like they’d forgotten how to stand. His bare feet carried her back across the cold earth, up the steps, into the warm, quiet dark of the trailer.

He kicked the door closed with his heel.

Cradled her like she was holy.

And whispered—because maybe she needed to hear it, maybe he needed to say it:

“You’re still you.”

And he wasn’t going anywhere.

The trailer was still.

Too still.

Benji had tucked her in like she was something breakable, like the bed might swallow her if he didn’t hold her together long enough for her bones to remember how to be bones.

The warmth of the blanket barely touched her skin.

She could still feel the dirt.

Still feel the trees in her lungs. The axe in her palm. The breath that wasn’t hers.

Benji was close—close enough that his presence wrapped around her like armor—but it didn’t stop the cold threading through her.

That kind of cold didn’t come from outside.

It was inside.

Rooted.

Burrowing.

She lay on her side, facing the trailer wall, one hand curled near her mouth like it might catch the whisper before it left.

But it was gone now.

Tommy.

She hadn’t just dreamed him.

She’d been him.

She saw through his eyes. Felt the weight of the axe. Felt the thrill of it.

And that was the part that made her stomach twist hardest.

Not the fear.

The rush.

She tried not to blink too hard. Tried not to think about what that meant.

And then—her phone buzzed.

A low vibration on the nightstand. Too soft, but it hit her like a jolt anyway.

Her arm felt heavy as she reached for it, screen too bright in the dark.

Caleb.

Her heart dropped before she answered.

And as he spoke—

Everything stopped.

The world inside the trailer faded.

Because his words weren’t just confirmation.

They were echoes.

Of what she’d seen.

Of what she was.

Tommy had chased two people through the woods. She hadn’t seen faces—but she’d felt fear that wasn’t her own. She remembered the flash of long hair. The panic in uneven footsteps. One fast. One faster.

And now Caleb was saying the names.

Saying what happened.

Saying who Tommy had gone after.

Heather’s vision narrowed. Her lungs forgot how to expand.

Alice.

She’d seen Alice.

She hadn’t known it was her.

And that was the worst part.

She’d seen Tommy raise the axe. She’d felt the way he wanted it to land. She almost wanted it too.

And it was Alice.

It was Alice Mae.

She didn’t remember hanging up.

Didn’t remember when Benji’s hand found hers again, warm and steady and full of something she didn’t feel anymore.

All she could hear was her own voice from earlier.

Tommy. Tommy Slater.

Like she’d called him.

Like she’d sent him.

The hive was louder now.

Not constant—but close.

Breathing in tandem just under her skin.

She clutched Benji’s hand tighter, fingers curling so hard her nails bit into his knuckles.

“I saw it,” she whispered. “I saw it before it happened.”

Her voice was hollow. Cracked.

“I didn’t know it was her.”

A pause.

Then, quieter:

“What if next time… I do?”

The thought lodged like glass behind her ribs.

Because the line between seeing and becoming was thinner than she’d thought.

And it was getting thinner by the second.

Benji didn’t flinch.

Not when her grip turned punishing. Not when her voice broke on the word her. Not when her breath hitched like she was about to splinter into someone else again.

He let her.

Let her dig in. Let her shake. Let her say it.

Because the alternative—the silence that swallowed her after Caleb’s call, the thousand-yard stare, the absence in her eyes—that had terrified him more than anything the curse could conjure.

But this?

This was Heather.

Even if her voice was hollow.

Even if she was holding him like she wasn’t sure which one of them was real.

She was here.

He shifted closer behind her, chest against her back, arm sliding around her waist. Not like a shield.

Like a tether.

“You didn’t send him,” Benji said, voice low and steady against her neck. “Don’t do that. Don’t carry something that’s not yours.”

But he knew it didn’t matter.

Because that’s what she did—carried things.

Bloodlines. Guilt. Darkness.

He exhaled, breath brushing her skin, warm where she was cold.

“You saw it because you’re tied in,” he murmured. “But that doesn’t make you them. That doesn’t make you the blade.”

His hand found hers again. Fingers laced. Knuckles blood-warm.

“I don’t care how close the hive gets. I don’t care if it’s breathing down your goddamn throat.”

His voice tightened. Fierce now. Almost shaking.

“You’re still you. Heather Goode. Not the curse. Not the sickness. You. And you came back tonight. That matters.”

A beat.

Then softer:

“You’ll keep coming back. Even if I have to drag you by your hoodie every time.”

He leaned in, pressed a kiss to her shoulder—light, grounding.

“I don’t care what you saw. I don’t care how real it felt. I care that you’re here. And that you told me.”

Another pause. His voice cracked, just once.

“That means I can fight with you.”

He let the silence sit after that. Let it settle.

Then—

“If it ever feels like too much,” he whispered, “you say my name. Not his.”

A beat.

“You say Benji. Say it a hundred times. Say it like a prayer if you have to.”

He tightened his arm around her. Held on.

“You pull me into the dream, Goode girl. I’ll fucking drag you out of it every time.”