Graham stepped fully inside, leaving the door open behind him. His eyes moved once around the room. Slow. Thorough. As if he were surveying an unfamiliar place. As if he hadn’t lived here once, too.

His eyes paused briefly on the patches of peeling paint, the cardboard-covered windows, the stack of unopened bills on the counter.

His expression never changed, but when his gaze returned to me, something in it had sharpened. His jaw clenched. “Get your coat, Bambi.”

My fists curled at my sides. “I’m not going anywhere with you.” 

“Yes. You are.”

I scoffed. “You don’t get to just show up and start making decisions.”

He picked up my shoes by the door and held them out to me. “I’m not asking.”

I glared at him, anger welling inside me. I wasn’t sure if I was more furious with him barging back into my life and trying to command me around… or with myself for the part of me that still wanted to listen. 

Graham still stood there, my shoes hanging from the tips of his fingers between us. The look in his green eyes told me that my defiance was in vain. 

My muscles ticked beneath my skin as every instinct warred with my anger.

Finally, I snatched my shoes from him. “Fine.” 

I shoved my shoes on harder than necessary before grabbing my coat from the kitchen counter and shrugging it over my shoulders.

I walked toward the door, brushing past him without looking up. The faint scent of something sweet and smoky clung to him, strangely familiar in a way I couldn’t quite place. 

I paused just past the threshold “Wait, what about my things?”

“Leave them,” Graham said, moving toward me. “You won’t need them.”

Before I could argue, he grabbed the door and slammed it shut.

He didn’t wait. He continued down the hall like he knew I’d follow.

And damn him, I did.

I glanced back to the door only once. There was no sadness. No guilt. What was I really leaving behind anyway? All that stood behind that door were boarded-up windows, an empty kitchen… and painful memories. 

Outside, I followed Graham toward a black truck parked at the curb. It was clean, polished, untouched by rust. It looked foreign against the crumbling apartment building.

Caroline’s car sagged beside Graham’s truck, its paint peeling and one headlight cracked. 

I stopped in front of it, my brows furrowing at the frost clinging to the hood and windshield. 

“Where is she?” I asked. 

“Gone.”

I straightened, my head jerking toward him. “What does that mean?”

He stood by the driver’s side door, one hand resting on the roof. The truck’s headlights flashed once in the dark. “Let’s go,” he said.

Frustration flared hot in my chest. “Graham—”

“Now, Bambi.”

The streetlamp caught the edges of his face, sharpening the angles I didn’t remember. He looked at me like he already knew what would happen next. Like there was no other version of this night. 

This was happening, with or without my cooperation. 

I swallowed, hesitating only a moment before moving to the passenger door. 

He watched me as I reached for the handle. The door opened with a solid, expensive sound, and he didn’t look away until I was seated inside. 

A second later, his door opened and closed, followed by the soft, decisive click of the locks.

Graham pulled off his coat and tossed it over the center armrest. Then he started the engine and cranked up the heat.

Without another glance in my direction, he pulled away from the curb. Caroline’s car, the dilapidated apartment—my entire life—shrank in the side mirror. 

I tore my eyes away and looked at Graham instead. His profile was sharper than I remembered. Harder. The boy who used to let me draw in his notebooks had grown into something else entirely.

His hands, larger than I remembered, rested steady on the steering wheel. I shouldn’t have noticed the way his forearm flexed beneath his Henley as he turned the wheel or the movement of his throat when he swallowed.

I did anyway.

Heat pooled low in my stomach, slow and unwelcome. Yet, I couldn’t look away. Every shift of his hand on the wheel made the muscle roll beneath his sleeve, making it worse. 

My thighs pressed together before I could stop them. 

His jaw tightened, the tendons in his hand flexing as his grip clamped harder around the steering wheel. 

The steady hum of the road abruptly changed beneath us. I blinked and looked away, realizing we weren’t on the main road anymore. 

The road had narrowed to a single lane, edged by towering trees that closed in around us and swallowed the last of the city lights.

The truck rocked gently as we continued down the gravel road. There were no other headlights, no houses, no streetlights. 

I hadn’t realized how far we’d driven until there was nothing left of the city behind us. Only trees. 

“Where are we?” I asked. 

Graham stayed silent beside me. Only when the trees finally thinned and a cottage came into view did he say, “Home.”

It had warm brown siding with dark shutters and smoke curling lazily from the chimney. Snow had settled thick across the roof like frosting. Soft light spilled from wide windows, scattering across the frost covered ground and making it glitter like crushed sugar.

The cottage looked warm, inviting even, but something inside me whispered that stepping inside would be anything but safe.

Graham stopped the truck a few feet from the wide wrap-around porch and killed the engine.

He undid his seatbelt and looked at me. “Come on.”

Without waiting, he climbed out of the truck and made his way to the front door, pausing there beneath the porch light. 

I hesitated, my hand stilling on the latch, as my eyes fixed on Graham’s silhouette. I knew the moment I stepped from the truck, there would be no going back. 

Not that Graham would have let me turn back anyway. 

 I drew in a steadying breath and pulled the latch.

I stepped out into the cold, the snow crunching softly beneath my shoes as I crossed the distance toward him. He watched me, silent and still beneath the porch lights amber glow. 

My pulse thudded louder with every step. 

Graham opened the front door and stepped to the side, letting me pass. 

Warm air immediately wrapped around me, sinking into skin that hadn’t felt heat in weeks. A fire burned low and steady in the fireplace, its light flickering across the walls. The smoky scent lingering in the air mingled with a subtle sweetness, like vanilla.

My shoes padded softly on hardwood floors as I moved deeper into the house, my body unconsciously drawn toward the fire.

The door shut behind me and I flinched, forgetting for just a moment where I was… and who I was with. 

I turned. [back to the door where Graham still stood. “Welcome home, Bambi,” he said.

Graham remained by the door. “Welcome home, Bambi.” 

There was that word again. Home.

He said it like I belonged there, and I wasn’t sure that was a good thing. 

The last time I lived with Graham, lines had blurred and boundaries had been crossed in ways they never should have.

Because he was my stepbrother. 

Chapter Three