When It All Came Crashing

CHAPTER TWELVE: When the Silence Starts to Lie

The storm had passed.

At least, the kind between the sheets.

Outside, the world was quiet again. Too quiet.

Cleo blinked slowly at the soft light seeping through the curtains, her body still warm, muscles deliciously sore, and Roman's arm heavy across her waist. The heat of his chest pressed to her back, steady and protective, like even in sleep, he wasn't letting her go.

She should have felt safe.

But something was wrong.

Stillness had never made her feel this uneasy before.

Her eyes slid toward her phone on the nightstand. For a moment, she didn't move. Didn't want to. But that familiar prickle crawled up her spine again, the kind that whispered something was off.

She reached.

Flipped it over.

And there it was.

A new message on the burner.

Why didn't you tell him you got my text?

Cleo's breath hitched.

The guilt hit harder than the fear.

She hadn't told Roman about the last message. She'd kept it to herself—wanted to protect the high they'd been floating on. Wanted one more night where they weren't running, hiding, fearing shadows that watched through windows and left phones on fire escapes.

But now the silence was lying.

And she could feel it curling around her throat.

She slipped out of bed slowly, careful not to wake him. Tiptoed to the bathroom and locked the door behind her before sitting on the closed toilet lid, phone trembling in her hand.

Her fingers hovered over the screen.

But she didn't reply.

Because she didn't know what to say anymore.

Moments later, there was a knock on the door.

"Cleo?" Roman's voice was gravel-soft, half-asleep but alert. "You okay?"

She cleared her throat.

"Yeah. Just... give me a second."

The silence answered her again.

And this time, it felt like it was smirking.

A short time later

The smell of bacon and coffee filled the small kitchen, grounding Cleo in something that felt almost... normal.

She stood barefoot in Roman's cousin's oversized hoodie, leaning against the counter, clutching her coffee cup like it could ward off the unease still coiling in her stomach.

Roman moved around behind her—shirtless, sleepy-eyed, cooking with one hand and sipping his own coffee with the other. The way he looked at her between movements, soft and a little smug, made it easy to forget for a moment that something was wrong.

Until—

Knock. Knock. Knock.

The front door.

Three hard, deliberate hits that cracked the quiet morning in half.

Cleo flinched, nearly spilling her drink.

Roman turned off the stove immediately, eyes narrowing. "Stay here."

"Roman—"