Creepin
By midnight, the borrowed house had sunk into silence. Enid and Robert had retired long before, exhausted by worry and age, their bedroom door closing on hushed whispers and weary sighs. Even Lucas, stubborn in his insistence to keep vigil with her, had finally surrendered to her gentle command.
“Sleep, Lucas,” she’d said, her voice steady and low. “He’ll come when he comes. I’ll be here.”
He’d studied her then, as if testing the strength of her resolve, but found no faltering in her dark eyes. Reluctantly, he left her alone with the lamp and the silence.
Hours passed. The clock marked them out with cruel precision — one, two, three. Shadows stretched and retracted along the walls. Pipes groaned, the night breathed, and still she waited. She had laid out food long ago, a tray of saffron rice, slow-cooked lentils, and the last of a chilled pudding, the dishes waiting like quiet companions.
It was close to four when the lock turned. Ethan entered, shoulders bent beneath the weight of the night, his shirt wrinkled, tie hanging loose. His eyes, hollow from confinement, lifted — and froze.
“You stayed up?” His voice cracked, rough with fatigue and disbelief.
“Of course,” Adelyn murmured, rising gracefully. “You must be starving.”
His laugh was a short, broken thing. “That’s one word for it.”
She guided him to the table, her movements calm, deliberate. When the lids were lifted, the warm perfume of the food filled the small space. Ethan reached for it like a man denied breath, eating with hunger that was almost primal.
Adelyn sat opposite, chin resting lightly against her hand. She didn’t speak, didn’t interrupt. She only watched — eyes steady, luminous in the lamplight, her silence more intimate than any words.
When he was done, Ethan leaned back, covering his face with his hands. His shoulders trembled. “They made me question myself, Adelyn. I know I didn’t do it — God, I know it. But when Mallory kept pressing, dragging up my past, the drinking, the fights… for a moment, I wondered. What if I had? What if I was too drunk, too angry, too lost to remember?”
His words splintered, raw and unfiltered. The man who once stood as the Chambers heir, confident and unflinching, now looked hollowed, stripped down to a frightened boy.
Adelyn moved closer, sliding her chair so their knees touched. She pulled his hands from his face and held them in hers. “Ethan, look at me.”
He did. His blue eyes, usually so steady, brimmed with torment.
“You didn’t do this,” she said, her voice steady, almost fierce. “They can twist your past, they can throw their accusations, but I know you. And I love you. That’s not going to change.”
His breath shuddered out, a broken exhale. “And the wedding—”
“We’ll postpone it,” she said quickly, before he could break further under the weight of it. “Not cancel, not abandon. Postpone. Until this is behind us.”
Ethan’s eyes closed, as if her words were a balm poured over an open wound. A moment later, he leaned forward and buried his face against her shoulder. His body shook — not from rage this time, but from grief, from relief, from the unraveling of too much held inside.
Adelyn stroked his hair, soft and rhythmic, whispering into the dark. “We’ll get through this. Together.”
When he finally lifted his head, his face was wet, his composure shattered — but his gaze was clearer. He cupped her face, trembling fingers pressing against her skin as if to assure himself she was real.
“I don’t deserve you,” he whispered.
“You do,” she whispered back. “And you’ll see that when this is over.”
He kissed her then, not with passion, but with gratitude and desperation, a promise sealed in the fragile stillness of the night.
---------------------------
Lucas had meant only to get a glass of water. The house was silent, the hour too late for anyone to be awake — or so he thought. He padded barefoot across the cool wooden floors, the glass cool against his palm, the stillness wrapping around him like a cloak.
But then, as he passed the dining room, the glow of a single lamp caught his eye. A faint hum of voices — low, intimate — drifted into the hallway.
He stopped.
Through the narrow crack of the doorway, he saw them. Ethan, still in his crumpled shirt from the day, was hunched forward, his hands clutching Adelyn’s as though she were the only anchor keeping him from drowning. His broad shoulders shook, and his face pressed against her shoulder.
Adelyn held him. Tenderly. Patiently. She bent her head, whispering words Lucas couldn’t hear, words meant only for Ethan, brushing her slender fingers through his hair with a gentleness that made the sight unbearable. She cradled him like something precious, fragile.
Something inside Lucas tightened — sharp and painful — as though invisible fingers were twisting around his ribs. He stood frozen, the glass still in his hand, his throat suddenly dry, every breath a battle.
Then Ethan lifted his head, weary eyes searching hers. And before Lucas could look away, Ethan kissed her — slow, aching, desperate — like a man starved for warmth. She didn’t pull back. She leaned in.
Lucas turned sharply, pressing his back to the wall. The glass nearly slipped from his hand. He closed his eyes, but the image burned behind his lids, carved into him like a wound.
Why does this hurt so much?
The question came unbidden, cruel in its clarity. She wasn’t his. She had never been his. She belonged to his brother — his older, brilliant, beloved brother. The one who had always taken center stage while Lucas remained in the shadows. It had always been Ethan who won.
And yet…
The memory of her laughter in the kitchen flooded him, bright and unrestrained. The way her dark eyes lingered on him just a fraction too long when no one else was watching. The soft, private smile she offered him in fleeting moments — small, dangerous sparks he had convinced himself meant nothing. But they had meant something. They had meant everything.
Lucas swallowed hard, pressing the heel of his hand against his brow. His heart thudded, heavy and treacherous.
“God help me…” His voice was hoarse, broken. “I’ve fallen for her.”
The words slipped into the empty hallway, a secret confession swallowed by the dark. No one would hear it, no one would ever know.
But Lucas did. And the truth gnawed at him with merciless hunger.