Morning crept in quietly—no golden fanfare, no birdcall, just the slow gray blush of dawn settling over the valley. Arden woke in the crook of Cole's arm, his steady breath warming the top of her head, his hand still wrapped around hers.
For a heartbeat, she forgot everything else.
Then it all returned.
The trial. Jamie's grave. The years they lost.
She eased away from him carefully, watching as he stirred but didn't wake. There was something boyish in the way he slept—unguarded, the lines of grief softened into peace.
She missed that version of him. The one before the fire. Before her brother's death tore them all to ruin.
By the time Cole woke, Arden was in the kitchen, humming absently as she stirred something over the stove. Bacon sizzled. Coffee percolated.
He stepped in, leaning against the doorframe. "You cook now?"
She looked over her shoulder. "You sleep on couches now?"
He grinned. "Touche."
They ate in the soft quiet of shared comfort. And for a while, it was easy. Familiar. Like they could pretend the world outside hadn't sharpened its knives.
But it never stayed easy for long.
Later that afternoon, a letter arrived.
No name. Just a seal. Wax. Black. Heavy.
Arden knew it before she opened it: Daniel.
Her husband.
She tore it open in the garden, away from Cole's eyes. The handwriting was his—precise, deliberate, cold.
> My dearest,
It seems the ghosts you left behind are stirring again.
Be careful who you forgive.
Some debts aren't meant to be erased.
—D.
Her hands trembled.
She burned the letter in the firepit, watching as the paper curled and blackened, its ashes lifting like curses into the wind.
She didn't tell Cole.
Not yet.
But that night, when he reached for her—gentle, reverent, asking nothing but to stay—she let him.
Because some truths lived better in silence.
Because some love was louder when unspoken.
And because deep down, she knew: the real fire hadn't fallen yet.
But it was coming.
Later that evening, rain began to fall—slow at first, then heavy, soaking the hills and turning the paths around the cottage into slick, silent rivers.
Cole was chopping wood by the shed when he found the box.
It was tucked under a tarp behind the stacked logs, marked in black ink: "Arden—Keep or Burn."
He stared at it for a long time before bringing it inside.
She was curled in a blanket by the fire, a book unread in her lap. The look on her face when he set the box down said everything: she had forgotten it was still here.
"I didn't mean to find it," he said quietly.
She didn't answer at first. Her fingers hovered over the lid.
Inside were photos—some from before the fire, some from after. Wedding pictures. Love notes from Daniel, too polished to be sincere. A lighter, engraved with the words "For everything we survived." Irony, bitter and sharp.
Cole didn't speak. He just waited.
Arden reached in and pulled out a photograph—her and Daniel on a mountaintop, their smiles too wide to be real.
"I thought marrying him would make the pain smaller," she whispered. "Instead, it made me smaller."
Cole knelt beside her. "You don't owe me your past."
"I know," she said. "But if I don't speak it, it keeps eating me alive."
She touched the lighter, then shoved it back in and closed the box.
"I let him in because I was afraid you wouldn't come back."
"I came back the moment you stopped pretending you were fine."
She looked at him then, and for the first time in years, she let herself believe the warmth in his eyes wasn't pity.
Later, as the storm raged and the fire flickered low, they sat together in silence—Arden's head on his shoulder, Cole's hand curled gently in hers.
But neither of them noticed the car that pulled up the road at the edge of the woods.
Or the man who stepped out into the rain.
Watching the house.
Waiting.
The storm didn't let up until midnight.
Arden stood at the window, watching the trees bow under the wind. The shadows between the trunks were thick and shivering. The cottage creaked like an old body remembering pain.
Cole came up behind her, his presence quiet but grounding.
"You're shaking," he said.
"I'm not cold."
She wasn't. Not really. But she felt thin, like her skin had forgotten how to keep her safe.
"I burned the letter," she whispered.
His brow furrowed. "What letter?"
She hesitated—then lied. "Just something I'd been keeping too long."
Cole didn't press. But she saw the way his eyes lingered on her face. The way he knew she hadn't told him everything. And still, he let it go.
Because trust didn't come all at once. Not after what they'd done to each other.
They moved through the evening gently, like dancers navigating a song neither had heard in years. She brushed his shoulder. He handed her a mug of tea. Their silences weren't empty anymore—they were full of things still learning how to be spoken.
But when night folded into the house, the weight of Daniel's presence returned.
Arden dreamed of fire.
Not the night that ruined them—but another blaze, this time inside her, burning through walls she'd spent years building. In the dream, Daniel stood outside the flames, untouched, smiling.
"Some debts aren't meant to be erased," he said again, and his voice was a knife.
She woke with a gasp.
Cole stirred beside her. "Nightmare?"
She nodded.
"Want to talk about it?"
She looked at him—eyes soft, lips parted from sleep, concern worn so openly it hurt.
"No," she said. "Not yet."
He kissed her forehead and held her close.
Outside, the rain finally stopped.
But at the edge of the woods, a man watched the house from the cover of trees.
He wasn't smiling.
And in his hand, he held the second letter.
Unopened.
Unforgiving.
The next morning, the air held that washed-clean scent only a storm could bring.
But Arden couldn't breathe in it.
She stood barefoot in the grass, staring at the edge of the woods. A crow perched on a low branch. Watching. Still.
Cole stepped out onto the porch, two mugs in hand. "You were up early."
"I didn't sleep."
He handed her the mug, his fingers brushing hers. "Was it the dream again?"
"No." She sipped. "It was the silence."
A beat.
"Funny," he said. "You used to say silence was a gift."
"Only when I didn't know what to listen for."
She hadn't told him the truth about the letter. Not the words, not the weight. And especially not that Daniel had found her.
Because that's what this was. A warning.
Daniel had always spoken in riddles, in veiled threats disguised as poetry. And this time, he wasn't writing from guilt. He was writing from confidence.
He was coming.
And Arden didn't know what he wanted more—vengeance, forgiveness, or to see her fall again.
Back inside, she pulled the box Cole had found onto the table. She opened it not for memory, but for armor.
Buried beneath the photos was the leather-bound journal Daniel had kept during the trial—pages and pages of manipulation dressed in mourning. It had always unsettled her, how he could be both grieving and cruel.
She flipped to the last entry. The ink had bled a little from age, but the words still burned:
> You always believed fire destroyed. But it also reveals. Burns off the lie. Melts the masks.
I wonder, my love, what will remain when I strip you down to your truth?
Arden slammed the journal shut.
She turned—and nearly dropped it.
Cole stood in the doorway, his face unreadable.
"Who is that journal from?" he asked softly.
She didn't answer.
Not with words.
She simply pushed the box away and whispered, "The man I married to forget you."
A long silence.
Then Cole stepped forward, placed both hands on the table, and leaned in.
"You don't have to forget me, Arden," he said, voice low, certain. "You just have to stop running."
And for the first time in years, she realized: maybe she wasn't afraid of Daniel.
Maybe she was afraid of what she might become if she let herself be loved again.
But still—somewhere beyond the trees, he waited.
And when the fire fell again, it wouldn't be metaphor.
It would be war.