You shouldn’t have answered his call.

You knew better. Knew exactly how this night would end the second his name lit up your phone. But still, you were here—sitting in Rafe Cameron’s car, watching the rain streak down the windshield, feeling the weight of everything unspoken pressing in around you.

He hadn’t said much since you got in. Just drove, knuckles tight around the wheel, his jaw clenched like he was trying to hold something back. The hum of the engine and the sound of the rain were the only things filling the silence between you.

It was always like this.

“Where are we going?” you asked finally, your voice softer than you intended.

Rafe exhaled sharply, shaking his head. “Nowhere.”

Nowhere. Right.

That’s exactly what the two of you were—circling the same mistakes, pretending this time would be different.

“You okay?” you asked, even though you knew the answer.

A short, bitter laugh left his lips. He turned to look at you then, the dim glow from the dashboard highlighting the cut along his cheekbone, the bruises forming beneath his jaw.

“Do I look okay?”

You frowned, reaching out before you could stop yourself, your fingers brushing against the damage. He flinched, but he didn’t pull away.

“Who was it this time?”

“Does it matter?”

It did. It always did. But you didn’t push. You never did.

Instead, you sighed and leaned back against the seat, staring at the blurred city lights outside.

“Why’d you call me, Rafe?”

A pause.

Then, barely above a whisper—“I don’t know.”

Liar.

You turned to him, searching his face for something real, something he wasn’t saying. “You don’t get to do this,” you murmured. “Call me like this, drag me back in.”

Rafe’s fingers flexed around the steering wheel. “You didn’t have to come.”

But he knew you would.

Because on nights like this—when the world was too quiet, when the weight of his own demons got too heavy—he always found his way back to you.

And maybe the worst part?

You always let him.