The memory of Beau's touch—his hands, his mouth—haunts me for the rest of the weekend. At first, it keeps my restlessness at bay, but I start to get antsy around mid-day. I push my couch around the living room for a couple hours, rearrange the pillows. I start on sorting through all the spices in the kitchen and find Beau's phone number scribbled on every takeout menu. The giddiness settles the uncomfortable itchiness for another few hours. To comply with Beau's request, I don't go running. I don't leave the apartment. I deep condition my hair, paint my nails, try a face mask that I find in one my bathroom drawers. I debate the pros and cons of calling Cassie for boy advice. I dial her number. Hang up.

And then I text Beau:

Ready when you are x

I tell myself it's perfect. Light. Flirty. Clearly making my move.

But then he doesn't reply.

Not Sunday night.

Not Monday.

Not Tuesday.

With each passing day, my frustration grows. Not enough to call or send another text, God no, but my skin feels feverish again. I swear that the air conditioner must have given up. When the maintenance man assures me that everything's working fine, I snap at him. Then apologize. And then almost burst into tears.

By Wednesday, I'm back to teetering on the edge of total insanity. My thoughts are scattered in every direction. My work suffers as I alternate between debating how to angle the office chairs and imaging text messages that would have been better to send. Even though I told Beau I wouldn't keep looking into Crestline, I find myself listening to the office chatter, skimming the documents on Cassie's desk, in the copier, the fax... I'm so caught up in collecting little pieces of ammunition, I forget to finish my own notes. It's not surprising that Hughes makes a point of chewing me out in front of the other paralegals.

Cassie, girls' girl that she is, brings me an iced coffee and an ibuprofen. Maybe my heart is just a little bruised, a little hungry for affection, but I realize that I kind of like hanging out with Cassie. I wish I would have tried being friendly sooner.

"Still ghosting you?" she asks, gentle and commiserating.

I nod miserably. The little tug in my chest, its residual warmth, blooms a fraction—as if it's trying, desperately, to reassure me.

For a fleeting moment, I let my mind wander to the possibilities that might ease the sting of Beau's silence. Maybe Owen had a massive seizure, or they've hired legal counsel who's insisting on distance until the Crestline case closes. Cassie, graciously, helps me come up with reasons why Beau hasn't answered: perhaps Beau's phone exploded or he's got lost rescuing orphans in the forest. Her explanations are cushion my anxiety enough to float me through the afternoon... until Andy fucking Harper shows up, sniffing around my desk again.

"Morningstar not enough for you, Rhea?"

I look up from the blinking cursor that's been taunting me for the last twenty minutes.

"I have no idea what you're talking about," I murmur.

"Don't you?" Andy presses, narrowing his gaze. He looks down the hallway before ducking further into my office, closing the door behind him. The forced smirk he always wears fades into something taut, angry. And then his voice comes low, quiet as he leans over my desk. "You begged to be off the project. Stay off it if you know what's good for you."

The words—and the threat—sink in, and I blink at my screen before blinked up at Andy. A whisper of adrenaline, the memory of it, pulses in my chest. Does he actually have proof I've been poking around? Did he tell Crestline to try to intimidate me? A dangerous, unfamiliar anger rises in me—as if I might leap from my chair and claw his eyes out if he doesn't back off.

"I'm not afraid of a bunch of corporate thugs," I snarl, "And I'm certainly not afraid of a sloppy junior partner who doesn't understand how his mitigation banking plan is going to bite him in the ass."

Andy flinches, surprise briefly coloring his features before he retorts, "I'm just—"

"Warning me?" I cut him off with a dark laugh, matching his hushed tones. "Please." The sarcasm in my voice masks the shadow of fear that I've gotten myself in too deep.

"Look," he hisses. "I don't fucking care if you go back and finish your degree, but if you try to fuck me over on this one—"

"You'll what, Andy?" There's something primal, dark, hungry unfurling in my chest. It's almost purring with anticipation, already taut and frustrated. My skin is prickling. The air grows taut between us.

I don't know what Andy sees in my face, but he retreats half a foot. His eyes flicker to the door. He smells like fear. Like prey. My finger tighten around the edge of my desk as I stare at him, unblinking, still and silent.

He swallows, but his words are acidic. "I would hate for something bad to happen to you, Rhea. So just back the fuck off."

Before I can make any reply, he leaves my office, slamming the door behind him. My heart pounds and that dark anger in my chest demands I chase the coward, but I hold tight to the desk. I breathe. And panic cools the anger.

What is wrong with me?

The question keeps me up all night.

I'm back to tossing and turning, rearranging pillows and blankets like a madwoman, but sleep evades me. I pace. I obsess. I watch the moon rise—full and lonely in the inky sky—and I watch it linger, then fall and fade into hazy dawn.

My head pounds, but the heat under my skin has eased the smallest fraction.

Though I try to make up for exhaustion with coffee, the caffeine seems to make me shaky instead of sharp. It's during the third cup—lukewarm, bitter, sloshing dangerously close to the rim of my mug—that I realize that I've mixed up the days.

I'm supposed to be at the courthouse.

I swear loudly enough to startle the woman walking her dog past my building. In a rush of adrenaline and caffeine, I toss on a blazer and tie my hair into something resembling a knot, and sprint to my car.

I don't have time to check my phone for missed messages like some moping teenager. Not again, at least. My brain has to rewire itself for something far more stimulating. Civil procedure. Building permits. Hughes' annoyance.

The courthouse is already busy with activity when I arrive, security lines inching forward with all the speed underpaid bureaucracy can offer. By the time I'm through the metal detectors and up the stairs, I'm sweating through my blouse and regretting every decision that led me to this morning.

At least I don't have to speak today.

When it comes to court, Hughes can't pretend to hoist off his responsibilities on me under the guide of supervision. I get to quietly track documentation, organize exhibits, pass notes between Hughes and our zoning specialist. At least it's not going to take any real brain power. Not when I don't have any left.

The Morningstar Development case isn't flashy—a real estate giant wants to push through zoning variances to build their high-end resort on former logging land. There's opposition from locals, environmental concerns, opposition to access roads... but at least it's not relocating a bunch of friendly locals. My usual arguments for why I need to work this job—debt, paying rent, basic survival—taste bitter in my mouth.

I try not to think about it as I slide into my seat, nodding at Hughes, who barely acknowledges me. His bad mood is already sucking up all the oxygen in the room.

The morning drags. I do my job. Pass notes. Highlight zoning precedents in a binder thick enough to kill a man. I keep my head down and try to stay focused despite the muggy feeling of the courtroom, the prickling tightness of my skin.

But during the lunch recess, when I finally escape the courthouse for a breath of air, someone calls my name.

"Rhea?"

I turn, already halfway through pulling my phone from my purse. And I freeze.

It's Nancy Chiu. Nancy, from law school. Nancy who sat two rows behind me in Con Law and always had pens in every possible shade. Who battled me for every right answer, for every class ranking. Her hair is shorter now, professional and glossy, but she still wears a little scarf tied around her neck.

"Nancy," I breathe, caught between disbelief and exhaustion.

She beams. "I thought I recognized you! It's been forever."

"Yeah," I manage. "Years."

She glances at my badge, her brow wrinkling. "Paralegal?"

I want to melt into the floor. "Yeah. I had to drop out during second year."

"Oh," she pauses. "But you're going back, right?"

It's like she can't imagine any fate worse than being a paralegal, but I suppose that is the worst kind of fate for a woman who never questioned what kind of lawyer she'd be, just knew she's make partner by thirty and marry a cardiologist.

I shrug and give her a practiced, unaffected smile. Or I try to. My face feels likes it's going to crack with the effort.

"I've been thinking about it lately."

"Well, what are you waiting for?" she says brightly. "There's so much demand for good attorneys. Especially in environmental litigation, right? You were always so sharp, Rhea."

My smile continues to edge toward brittle. "Thanks."

"You should finish," she says, lowering her voice slightly. Kind. Sincere. "Seriously. Don't let it go to waste."

She gives my arm a quick squeeze before heading back inside.

Her words are like stones in my pocket for the rest of the day. Sure, I'd toyed with the idea of going back. Daydreams. I'd used it as an excuse with Hughes. But had I really considered it? Not exactly. I hadn't done the math. I hadn't cross referenced the negative dollar signs of my mom's medical debt against the grad school debt still accumulating interest. I hadn't let myself imagine myself standing in a courtroom or representing my own clients. It came too close to digging up the Rhea Dawson I'd buried.

As much as I hate to admit it, that version of me was already making glimpses through the cracks in my safe, corporate veneer. She was the one who loved to hike, who was willing to risk her heart for a taste of affection. A chance at love. More and more, that Rhea Dawson was clawing her own way out of the grave I'd been determined to keep her in.

Finish. Don't let it go to waste.

It echoes in my head. Even when Hughes tears into me for mislabeling a folder, even when my pen explodes ink across a case summary, even when my back aches and I feel like I'm crawling out of my skin.

I leave the courthouse just past six, the sun just starting to pain the sky with pale orange and lilac as it sets. I'm too tired to buy groceries, to cook. Too wrung out to think about anything but food and maybe collapsing in bed for the next—I check my watch—eleven hours. I place an order at my favorite Thai place and shuffle home. Shower off the clammy sweat dried to me, try to scrub away the restless thoughts, exchange my sharp businesswear for pajama shorts and the lightest tank top I own.

When the knock finally comes at the door, I don't check the peephole. I unlock the door, swinging it open with a half-formed thank-you already on my lips.

And then I pause.

The guy holding the delivery bag isn't the shaggy-haired teenager that usually drops off my food. He's not the chatty middle-aged neighbor who always brings over my food when it gets to her place by mistake. No. This man is big. Broad-shouldered. He's dressed in a dark sweatshirt with the hood pulled up like a cowl despite the heat.

He holds the takeout back loosely in his band.

"Pad see ew?" His voice is like gravel being poured down the garbage disposal.

My nerves light with taut instinct. Run. Run. Run.

"Yeah," I say slowly, extending a cautious hand to take the bag.

But he doesn't let go.

He lifts his head, fixing me with eerily pale eyes. The man from the coffee shop. My heart stutters into sprinting terror as I stand there. Frozen. He sniffs the air. Breathes in deep. His eyes suddenly darken with dilating pupils.

I take a step back. Heart leaping to my throat.

He lunges.

His hand shoots forward—not for the bag, not for my phone or my wallet—but for me. He slams his shoulder into the door, forcing it open. I stagger back as he crashes into my apartment. I swear I see a flash of teeth as his fingers curl around my wrist. His other hand tightens around my throat, threatening to rip the air out of me. My phone clatters to the floor.

"Don't fight," he growls, his mouth suddenly horrifyingly close to my ear.

Something in me snaps.

Not my mind. Not my fear. That dark, primal force that's been sleeping in my chest.

I don't freeze. I don't try to run.

With a half-smothered scream, a desperate cry for help, I claw at the man's face, his eyes. He stumbles back, more from surprise than pain, but the lines of my nails leave a trail across his cheek. He snarls, releasing his grip the barest fraction so that I can twist free. His nails leave stinging lines on my hand. His fingers crush with bruising pressure against my throat as I push away.

I scramble for my purse by the door, for the can of pepper spray that my hippie-earth-loving-but-ultimately-very-realistic mother begged me to always carry. My fingers close around it. I spin. I spray directly into his face, even as he lunges for me again.

He screams—howls—his voice somehow more animal than human. The sharp bite of the spray makes us both cough, but the distraction is enough. As he stumbles back a few steps, I'm able to slam the door shut. Jam the deadbolt in place.

He rams the door.

Eyes blurred with tears, hands shaking, I grab my phone, sprint to my bedroom, lock that door. The bathroom. Lock it too. I dial 911 on the cracked screen.

Three rings. Four. Six.

"911, what's your emergency?"

Everything comes out in a breathless rush. The break-in. The man. Stalking me. The size of him. The way he smelled me. The way he wasn't right. I don't hear what the operator says to my insane rambling, because I'm not listening to her. I'm listening for him. The banging against the door has stopped. Everything is so tautly silent, I don't even want to breathe.

The cops arrive in six endless minutes, but there's no sign of the man. No take out bag. None of my neighbors saw him. There's just a sharp scent in the air that makes the little hairs on my neck prickle.

They take my statement, ask the usual questions. I agree to file a report, to press charges, even though I know it won't matter. My gut tells me, somehow, that he isn't going to show up in a mugshot database. Crestline wouldn't be so foolish to get caught.

When the cops leave, I double-check every lock. Every window. Every shadow.

I turn on every light.

And I call him.

It's stupid. I know it's stupid. But he warned me, didn't he? He told me to stay safe.

And now I believe it was for a reason.

It rings.

And rings.

Straight to voicemail.

I hang up before the beep. I stand there, in the silent and over-lit apartment, phone in hand, feeling small. Foolish. Alone.

I told myself it was okay to want more. To want someone. That that sliver of hope wasn't going to end with my fractured heart torn into pieces. I was wrong. I should have known better.

When I lost friend after friend growing up, when my mom died... I thought I'd finally learned my lesson. No one is safe. You can only rely on yourself. But I let myself get burned again. The fool playing with fire. The lonely fool with pepper spray residue on her fingers and door that might not hold next time. I wipe away an escaped tear with the heel of my hand, push Beau's jacket out of my bed. I don't need him. I'll take care of myself. I always do.

And I curl into bed, fully clothed, a chef's knife tucked under my pillow.

Sleep is slow to come.

When it does, I don't dream of Beau.

I dream of a wolf.

It stands at the edge of the forest, shrouded in mist. Its eyes are wild, but calm. Watchful. It doesn't snarl. It doesn't pace. It just waits.

I move toward it.

The wolf doesn't run.

I take another step.

And then I realize—I'm not walking on two legs anymore.

The forest floor beneath me is soft and damp, and I can feel every fallen leaf beneath my feet. Or paws, rather. My breath fogs the air. I open my mouth to speak, but no words come—only the low, rumbling growl of something primal.

The wolf lifts its head. Tilts it.

And I know, somehow, it's not watching me like a stranger.

It's watching me like a mirror.