CHAPTER 5: THE NIGHT WE ALMOST SAID IT

Cordelia’s fingers dug into Angel’s sleeve before Lorne even hit the chorus, hauling him out of his chair with a yank that nearly toppled the Fyarl demon beside them. “Outside. Now.” Her voice was steel wrapped in velvet snark, the kind that brooked zero argument. She didn’t wait for his coat to settle or for the green-skinned empath to finish warbling Sarah McLachlan like he’d personally read their doom in the stars. She just dragged him through the side door, the bass from inside thumping against her ribs like a second heartbeat she didn’t have time for.

The alley door slammed behind them, cutting off the music mid-note. Cool night air slapped her face, but it did nothing to ease the fire under her skin—the one that had nothing to do with the visions and everything to do with the secret she’d been stupid enough to share with him alone.

She whirled on him, lips pressed into a tight, furious line that screamed don’t you dare before she even spoke. “You think this is cute? Parading me into karaoke night like Lorne’s gonna sprinkle happy-dust and fix everything? Newsflash, Angel: I’m not here for the sing-along. That song? That was aimed at us. At me. And I’m not playing.”

Angel’s eyes flicked over her shoulder, checking the empty alley out of habit, then locked back on hers. “Cordy—”

“Don’t.” She jabbed a finger into his chest, hard enough that any living man would’ve staggered. He didn’t. “Don’t ‘Cordy’ me like I’m one of your lost causes. You want me to spill to Wes and Gunn and Fred? Tell them every vision is frying another chunk of my brain until there’s nothing left but static and goodbye? That I’m dying, Angel—slow, ugly, and on your watch? No. This stays between us.”

His hand caught her wrist, thumb brushing the frantic beat of her pulse like he could memorize it. “They’re your family,” he said, voice low and rough, the kind that always slipped past her defenses. “We don’t do secrets. Not the ones that matter. I’m watching you hurt and I can’t—”

“Can’t what?” She stepped into him, chin lifted, lips still that stubborn slash. “Fix it? Save the day? Join the club. You’ve got your own centuries of baggage, Mr. Brood-In-The-Shadows. This one’s mine. I told you because… because you’re the only idiot who looks at me like I’m still Cordelia Chase, Queen of Sunnydale, not some ticking time-bomb in heels. But if the others know, Wes’ll drown in musty books, Gunn’ll punch walls until his knuckles split, and Fred—” Her voice hitched, just once, but she powered through. “Fred’s smiling again. I’m not stealing that. Not for this.”

He moved then, crowding her back until the alley wall met her shoulder blades—rough brick catching on her jacket, grounding her when everything else felt like it was spinning out. Not trapping. Never that. Just close enough that the space between them vanished, the fight crackling like ozone before a storm. His free hand braced beside her head, leather creaking, and suddenly they were breathing the same ragged rhythm—hers quick and alive, his unnecessary but matching anyway, like the demon in him refused to let her go solo even on this.

“You think I don’t get it?” he growled, forehead creasing in that way that made her fingers itch to smooth it. “Carrying something that’s killing you from the inside? Every damn day. But this—hiding it, just the two of us in the Hyperion at 3 a.m. with those books you pretend aren’t about seer brain-death—it’s not protecting them. It’s making us into something—”

“Us?” The word slipped out sharper than she meant, but her hand was already fisting in his shirt, pulling instead of pushing. “There’s no us, Angel. There’s me, the dying psychic drama queen, and you, the guilt-ridden hero who thinks proximity equals penance. Don’t twist this into—”

“Too late,” he whispered, so soft it should’ve been lost in the distant traffic hum. But it wasn’t. It landed between them like a promise neither of them had asked for.

Her eyes flew wide, searching that stupid, beautiful, eternally tormented face. The secret had done this—cracked open the space between them night after night until the almost-touch became this. His head bowed to hers, forehead to forhead, cool skin against her flushed one, and they stayed there, pinned by the wall and the weight of everything they weren’t saying. Chests heaving in sync. Breathing like they were alive. Like this moment could stretch forever if they just didn’t let go.

“Don’t you dare fall in love with me now,” she whispered against his mouth, the words cracking at the edges—snarky, defiant, but raw with the fear and the want and the why the hell now. “I’m not built for tragic endings, Angel. I was supposed to outlive you all and rule L.A. in Louboutins. Not… this. Not us in some filthy alley pretending the visions won’t win.”

His eyes stayed closed, lashes dark against pale skin, and for one aching second she let herself feel it—the bloom of something terrifying and perfect in the middle of the pain. No miracles yet. No easy outs. Just them, the fight bleeding into something softer, closer, inevitable.

Too late.

~ NEXT CHAPTER ~

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