The breakable items on the tray clatter together, a result of my escape attempt as I deposit them into Buddy's hands, ignoring his look of disbelief, utter confusion, having heard nothing of the argument in the kitchen between Aidan and his housekeeper. However, I don't make it far.

Victoria emerges from the kitchen first, features contorted with suspicion.

"How long have you been out here?"

I stare at her, stiff as a board. I wish it were easier to breathe. "Long enough."

"You were eavesdropping on us?" she accuses, wide-eyed, glancing to Aidan, who exits, wiping his hands on a dishtowel, avoiding my gaze altogether. "Aidan—"

"Leave it alone, Victoria," he admonishes, darkly. Aidan gestures to Bud, relieving him of the dirty dishes.

"She was just with me, Vic," Buddy says to his wife, disapprovingly. "Simmer down, all right?"

She's on the losing side of the fight, which seems new for her. They are clearly close, and my presence is a streak of discontentment in this household.

"I'm going to get some air," I announce, skirting past Aidan, who seems somewhere between mortification and complete frustration. Our glows are gone, reminding me of how quickly the world can disrupt something so pure. I walk to the coat rack, stealing Aidan's oversized coat. While I'm at it, I take gloves and a scarf too just to be safe.

I haven't had fresh air in days, and the first whiff of icy air is hard to take. Still I prevail and shut the door behind me, noticing Victoria and Buddy paved the path on their way here. I don't have it in me to wander, still traumatized by the snow and the forest, so I stand, shivering, just looking at it all, trying to wonder what this place looks like in spring.

I bet it's beautiful.

God, I want a cigarette. Its how I know I'm truly beat—the fact that my urge for nicotine has arisen. It usually only surfaces after guilty sex or a tough case. My time at Hughes manor has warranted an addiction.

I welcome freezing out here rather than hearing another disapproving word from Victoria. When the door opens, I stiffen, only relaxing when it's Buddy that exits, putting on his own winter gear.

"Nothing easy about this place," he sighs, ruefully, coming up beside me. I nod, chuckling darkly.

"You can say that again."

I kick my boot into the snow, watching it pile up into a messy weaning tower.

"The sheriff called earlier today. It's why we trekked up here." He smiles softly when I give him my eyes, anticipating his next words. "The roads will be paved tomorrow. They said mid-afternoon at latest."

"Oh..." I turn my gaze back to the snow. Oh.

That means tomorrow I can go home...I will have to go home.

That means our seclusion is over.

I do my best to not show him how effected I've become.

"Right in time for New Years, too. I bet you'll be glad to go out with your friends and all."

I nod, attempting a smile, remembering my plans with Samantha for our boss's large soiree, an extravagant cluster of the elite and socially relevant people in the West coast. A night to go crazy, because no one will remember it in the morning. I've always gone with Bradley, and that thought is daunting.

The door opens and Victoria steps out, still putting on her coat while Aidan holds the door ajar patiently. Her mouth is a small dot, tense enough to blend in with her skin color.

"Happy holidays, Josephine," she murmurs, softly. "I'm sorry. Maybe someday you will understand my hesitance."

"Happy holidays," I whisper, "to you both. It was nice to meet you."

They are a good distance away when Aidan speaks.

"I'm...sorry you heard all that."

I continue to watch them go, my chest swollen with unanswered questions, which are completely cutting off my air supply. He said a lot when he thought I wasn't hearing him, some of it scary beautiful, some of it hauntingly concerning. As much as I'd like to remain positive for him, be that light he requires, I feel anything but.

I'm so confused, and I'm not allowed to fix that. I have to accept it.

"I'd like to be alone...for a bit," I tell him, cowardly enough to do it facing away from him. I hear the door begin to creak as he shuts it, but he hesitates.

"Will you...just...not wander, okay? Please."

My heart clenches, and I cannot deny him an answer. "I won't."

He leaves me be, allowing me my first time to think in days.

                                                ***

I've lost my appetite. The cluster-fuck in my mind has rid me of the need for necessities. Seated on the edge of the mattress, staring at the reading nook in Aidan's guest room, I've watched day turn into night, wasting my last day with him lost in my own mind.

He's left me alone, giving me the space I desire. It's eerily quiet, the setting sun bringing enough darkness that I'm forced to leave my spot and turn on a candle. Without a fire burning, the room has an unpleasant chill to it. If I breathe hard enough, I can see my own breath curling in the air.

It's the desire for alcohol that finally makes me emerge from my confines, and brave the hallways. My hands glide over the stone walls, taking in the feel of them admirably. I've fallen in love with this place, with the oddness of it, and to leave knowing I may never return physically pains me.

Aidan's in the parlor with the liquor, as I expected he'd be. Seated in one of the great chairs by the fire, he sees me at the door and his chest expands with a deep inhale. There's a glass of dark liquid on his knee, the tumbler on the floor beside his feet.

I take a seat opposite him, my bones tensing from my lack of movement. I regard him silently, and he does the same, neither of us making a sound for quite some time.

Victoria came in and obliterated our bliss. Whether it was oblivious doesn't matter, it was bliss.

"Buddy told me I'll be able to leave tomorrow."

He nods, tilting the glass absentmindedly. "I know."

My thumbs twiddle together, tormented by my unsettled heart.

"You don't have to go," he whispers, softly, almost reluctantly. "You could stay."

"Or...you could come with me?"

The way his features mar with reluctance, with knowingness gives me my answer. He's not prepared for something beyond these walls. I've known it for days, and possibly since I arrived here. Aidan has torn himself away from the chaos of the real world, from the possibility of more pain.

My world would destroy him.

In a world of so much opportunity, we're restricted by something so inward. He lives hours away, but if he wanted to, he could come to the city. He could meet my friends, begin to work again. We could take turns being there and secluding ourselves here.

Not everything would have to change.

This house is a direct connection to his daughter. I'd never suggest he leave it all behind, but he could make a life, a life outside of these walls, something meaningful.

He has to want it though. I can't force him to come to Seattle.

And everything he's said today has proved that he's far from stable.

He said he didn't care if I was deceiving him. He just wants to feel this while he can...which means he doesn't expect it to last. That's the overwhelming thought that's festered in my brain the entire day.

I'd begun to expect more than he can give.

I've never been on this side of the spectrum. It's fucking painful.

"I wish I could let it all go. I wish I could do that for you," he confesses.

"You don't have to let go of it all, you know? We could get by."

"You don't deserve to get by, Jo. You don't deserve secrecy or uncertainty like your father. I don't want to be another person you cannot rely on. I want you to be happy."

"You are apart of that equation now, Aidan. I can't just give up on you. You want me to, so badly. I can see it."

"I'd be a monster if I didn't want you to find someone else."

"I...guarantee what happened to them you had less to do with it than you think," I whisper, so frightened to test him this way that tears spring up in my eyes. His mouth sets, his eyes flickering to the fire. He simmers in his anger quietly long enough that my frozen feet warm by the fire.

"Victoria was right in many ways, Josephine. Her delivery was god-awful, but she was right. I haven't been honest with you, and I've allowed you to sit in complete confusion for days, and that was wrong of me. I just...couldn't fight this. I couldn't fight what I feel for you."

I sit forward, imploring him. "Then, tell me, Aidan. I'll prove to you that I won't leave."

I hate that I have to beg him. I hate that my profession makes it impossible for him to trust me.

I hate that I've only known him this long. I wish he could confide in me.

His face is full of shame, of regret and it angers me. "I told you when we met, Jo—"

I shoot out of my chair, choking on my own words, throwing my hands in the air. "Yes, yes! You told me! I get it. I get that there is horror here. I get that there is horror in you that will never go away. I'm a perceptive woman, Aidan. I study people for my job. I see your turmoil, I see it all! And it's tearing me apart. It's tearing me apart because I've crossed my boundaries with you."

He stares at me, hardly breathing, and I chuckle, pissed at myself, at him.

"Maybe I'm overreacting. Maybe this house has bewitched me. But, I've thrown away every philosophy, every promise to myself in one goddamn week with you and it's flipped my world upside down. I tried to stop it. I tried to get a handle on it. I tried...and it didn't work." My hands clasp each other over my chest as my emotions quadruple, rendering me helpless to them. "I have never wanted anyone in my life, Aidan...I want you."

He looks down, shaken by my confession. I walk to him and bend down, grabbing his knees, needing him to look at me.

"I want you, and your pain, and your thoughts, and your guilt. I want to share them. I want to be here, so you never feel you have to disappear again." He won't look. He won't. I grab his face, forcing myself between his legs. His eyes are reserved and red-rimmed, desperate to keep me out. "Aidan, we could be a team. A real team. We could try to make this work, try to—"

"I will never leave this place, Josephine," he interjects, quietly. I stare at him, despondently. "Lily is here. I'm not leaving. I'm not moving on. This is where my life ends."

"No—"

He turns his face from my reaching grasp, and attempts to stand. I have to push back, and push onto my feet to give him the space to. I want to curl up on the floor.

"I'll never be normal. I'll never be Bradley, Jo. I'm not that kind of man anymore."

"I don't want that. I don't want what he has to offer—"                                               

"No, you want a fuck up. You want someone to save."

"That's not true."

"It is. And you are doing it for beautiful reasons. You want to help me. You see how I live my life, how I think, how I retreat and you want to fix me." He walks to me, clasping my face, wiping the tear that falls over my cheek. "I've lost my child. I've lost my wife. My parents. And their absence haunts me every day of my life. I am irreparable, Josephine."

I shake my head, my chest constricting with sobs at how easy it is for him to write himself off, how easy it is to reject me. I drop my head into his sweater, clasping the material desperately. His hand strokes my hair, comforting me as I fall apart for him.

"Please, stop. Stop saying this. Stop doing this."

"I want more for you," he whispers, kissing my temple. "More than this."

"I don't want it," I beg. "I don't."

I lift my face, finding his eyes, hoping my tears will bring him regret, will force him to rethink his words. His eyes are calm, and resolute—an abyss of determination.

It's my touch, my hand upon his face, that reveals a small crack to his mechanics. His features flinch, his eyes slamming shut as he tears himself from me, and drops the glass he'd been holding onto a table on his way out of the room.

A/N: Ouch, we're getting to the real stuff, guys. </3