The room had gone quiet, except for the soft hum of Elias' laptop and the occasional creak of the floorboards as he paced. We'd gone over the footage twice, dissected the timeline, and made notes on everything—from the strange glitch in the Ring camera to the precise time the grandmother stopped answering her phone.
But my body… it was starting to feel like a fog.
I stood up too fast, my vision tilting.
"Whoa—" I staggered, one hand reaching out blindly.
Elias caught me before I could fall, his arms wrapping around me instinctively. I leaned into him without thinking, my cheek brushing against his chest. He was warm. Steady. Too close.
"I—I'm fine," I murmured, trying to straighten, but my knees disagreed.
"You're burning up," Elias said, his voice tight with concern.
"I just need sleep," I lied, trying to pull away.
He didn't let me. Instead, he pressed the back of his hand to my forehead. His expression shifted. "Scarlett, you're running a fever."
"It's just exhaustion. I've been staying up and—"
"That's not something to brush off," he said, guiding me gently back to the bed. "Sit. Now."
His tone left no room for argument.
I felt the mattress dip beside me as he pulled the blanket up, grabbing a water bottle and cold cloth from his bag—ever the over-prepared investigator.
"You're sleep-deprived, emotionally wrecked, and pushing yourself too hard. You need to rest or your body's going to shut down on you."
I didn't argue. My eyelids were already drooping, the fever making everything soft and blurred. Still, I managed a faint, stubborn smile. "You sound like Savannah."
"She'd kill me if I let you collapse," he muttered with a half-smile, wringing out the cloth and gently laying it across my forehead.
And then I was gone, slipping into sleep, safe under the weight of his care.
Later that night… (No one pov)
The door creaked open slowly.
Ana stepped into the dorm room like a shadow, moving quietly, her eyes scanning the dark until they landed on us.
Scarlett was asleep, her face pale but peaceful beneath the dim glow of Elias' laptop screen. Elias sat in the chair beside the bed, slumped slightly, exhausted but vigilant, arms crossed and eyes half-lidded as he kept watch over her.
Ana didn't know why she'd come. Maybe guilt. Maybe curiosity. Maybe something she didn't yet have a name for.
But seeing them like this—Scarlett safe, Elias present—it sparked something she hadn't felt in years.
Warmth.
A strange, unfamiliar sense of comfort bloomed in her chest. Not jealousy. Not resentment. Just... peace. As if, just for a moment, the chaos outside the room didn't exist.
She didn't move. Didn't speak.
She just stood there in the silence, watching two people who, against the odds, were trying to protect each other from a storm neither could yet see the end of.
And for the first time in her life, Ana didn't feel alone.