The worst part was that he never asked her to stay, but she did anyway.

Rafe Cameron wasn’t her boyfriend. They weren’t just friends either, though she wished she could pretend it was that simple. Everyone had warned her—Sarah, her old friends, even girls she barely spoke to—but she didn’t listen. She refused to be another cautionary tale, another girl left in pieces. She refused to be wrong about him.

So, she let herself fall. Let herself believe that maybe, just maybe, she’d be the one he actually cared about. That she was different.

She cut off everyone who tried to “save” her, sick of hearing the same tired words. He doesn’t love you. He never will. But they didn’t understand—she couldn’t afford to lose another person. Not again. Not when she wasn’t even sure she had him to begin with.

And yet, Rafe never made any promises. He never claimed to love her the way she loved him. Still, she clung to every fleeting moment of softness, every drunken confession, every late-night touch that made her feel like maybe she mattered.

But deep down, she knew.

She knew about the other girls. She knew they all ended up the same—heartbroken, bitter, warning the next one to run. But she wouldn’t be them.

She couldn’t be.

So, she stayed. Not because he asked her to, not because he loved her, but because she still chose to love him anyway.