I told myself I was just stopping by.
That was the story I'd settled on during the drive over, casual, unplanned, nothing that would give away the fact that I'd spent the entire morning turning Saraph's words over in my head.
What if it's not family stuff. What if it's something else entirely.
I hated that the thought had taken root. I hated more that I hadn't been able to talk myself out of it.
So I went. Not to confront him. Just to see.
The door was unlocked when I got there, which struck me as careless for a man who was supposedly guarding some big secret.
I let myself in, calling his name once, twice, into a quiet apartment that smelled faintly like his cologne and looked exactly as it always did.
Throw blanket folded over the couch arm. Laptop open on the desk, screen dark.
I stood there for a second, feeling slightly ridiculous. What had I expected to find? A confession written on a sticky note? Evidence of some great betrayal sitting out in the open?
Nothing was out of place. Nothing was hidden. It was just Daniel's apartment, looking like Daniel's apartment.
I was still standing there, half embarrassed at myself, when I heard his key in the lock.
He stepped in with his earbuds on, scrolling his phone, and nearly walked straight into me before he looked up.
"Nuella?" He pulled an earbud out, surprised. "Hey, I didn't know you were coming by."
"I didn't either," I admitted. "I was in the area. Thought I'd check on you."
He studied me for a second, like he could tell there was slightly more to it than that, but he didn't push. "Well, good timing. I just got snacks."
He held up a small grocery bag like evidence, and something in me deflated with relief, the suspicion I'd been carrying all morning finally allowed to leave my body.
"Snacks," I repeated. "That's what you've been doing?"
"Among other things. Why, what did you think I was doing?" His eyebrow lifted slightly, teasing.
"Nothing," I said quickly. "I just, wanted to see you."
He didn't call me on the lie. He just smiled, that familiar easy smile, and gestured toward the couch. "Come on. I got the sour ones you like."
We ended up sprawled across his couch with the snacks between us, some show neither of us was actually watching playing in the background.
He stole the last of the sour candies before I could get to them, which started an entirely undignified fight over the bag that ended with both of us laughing too hard to actually care who won.
"You're terrible," I said, breathless, trying to wrestle the bag back.
"I'm efficient," he said. "There's a difference."
"There really isn't."
He finally surrendered the bag, but not before flicking a piece of popcorn at me from the bowl on the table.
I retaliated immediately, and for a few minutes the apartment was pure chaos, popcorn scattered across the couch cushions, both of us laughing at nothing, the tension I'd carried in with me completely gone.
Eventually we settled, my head finding its place against his shoulder, his arm coming around me like it always did. The show kept playing. Neither of us was watching it.
"I'm glad you came by," he said quietly, after a while.
"Me too." I meant it more than the casual tone let on.
He tilted his head down, and I lifted mine, and the kiss that followed was unhurried, the kind that doesn't need to prove anything, just the quiet confirmation of two people who were, despite everything, still exactly where they wanted to be.
He pulled back just slightly, resting his forehead against mine.
"I know I've been distant," he murmured. "I haven't forgotten that I owe you an explanation. I just need a little more time to get it right."
"I know," I said, and found that I actually meant it. Whatever doubt I'd walked in with had nowhere left to live in this room, surrounded by popcorn and his arm around me and that particular look in his eyes that had never once, in all our time together, suggested anything but how much he meant it.
"Soon," he said again.
"Soon," I agreed. "But for now," I reached for the candy bag he thought he'd successfully hidden behind the couch cushion. "I'm taking these back."
He laughed, didn't even try to stop me, and pulled me closer instead.
For the rest of the evening, the doubts that had driven me there that morning felt very far away.
Whatever Daniel was carrying, I trusted, finally and fully, that it wasn't going to break us.
It was just going to take him a little more time to set it down.