Sauvage
and Silence

Head still swimming, I poured myself into the chaise on Ariel’s patio. The thumpa-thumpa had finally gone silent, the last of the revelers spilling out into the Los Angeles night. Without them, the house felt cavernous. Even the city seemed to have taken a breath.

Silence was rare in WeHo. Peace was rarer.

I’d lived there barely a year, long enough for the novelty of my accent to wear thin but not long enough to belong anywhere. There had been hookups, dates, and several men who’d said, “I love the way you talk,” as if I were a novelty voice setting they could switch off when they got bored.

Nathan had liked the accent, too. In the beginning.

I took a slow drink of water and watched the lights burning in the hills. Five months free, and I was doing all right. I had a condo, a job, and enough food to keep from starving. A low bar, perhaps, but it was mine.

The scent reached me before the footsteps did.

Sauvage.

My body reacted faster than my mind. My shoulders locked. Water sloshed over my hand as I lurched upright, ready to run from a man who couldn’t follow me anywhere anymore.

“Hey,” someone said behind me. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.”

Not Nathan’s voice.

I turned. The stranger had stopped several feet away. Tall, dark-haired, unfairly handsome—and making no move to come closer. His hands hung loose at his sides, where I could see them.

Different face. Different voice. Open patio door behind him. People still talking inside.

I let out the breath trapped in my chest.

“You caught me off guard,” I said.

“I gathered.” He nodded toward the empty chair beside mine. “Would you rather I go, or may I sit?”

That earned him a second look. “You can sit.”

He did, leaving the small table between us. “You’re new around here, aren’t you? Tennessee?”

I didn’t hate Georgia enough to let that pass. “Georgia.”

“Damn. And here I thought being from Kentucky gave me regional expertise.”

“They ought to revoke your credentials.”

His laugh was warm and unforced. “Immediately.”

For a while, neither of us spoke. The quiet settled differently this time. Not empty. Shared.

He didn’t ask why I’d nearly jumped out of my skin. Didn’t glance at the water trembling in my hand. He simply leaned back and looked toward the hills, giving me room to collect myself without pretending he hadn’t noticed.

That, more than the handsome face, made me curious.

“How long have you lived here?” I asked.

“Eleven years.” He considered the skyline. “Still feels alien sometimes. The mountains are too tall, nothing is the right shade of green, and there are far too many palm trees.”

“I’m told people like those.”

“People are wrong. What I wouldn’t give for one decent oak.”

Homesickness tightened unexpectedly beneath my ribs. “Do you ever think about going back?”

“Sometimes. But I’ve built a life here. Leaving would mean giving up more than I’m ready to lose.” He glanced at me, then away again. “What about you?”

“There’s nothing for me back home.”

The answer came too quickly. He must have heard the lie in it, but he didn’t challenge me.

There was plenty back home: a rat-spit farm, a mother who sent birthday cards even when I didn’t answer her calls, and a father whose last words to me had been Then don’t come back. There was also everything I’d said before that—the cruel things I had hurled because Nathan had convinced me that anyone who questioned him was trying to control me.

The irony had teeth.

“Maybe there is,” I amended. “I made a mess before I left.”

“Messes can sometimes be cleaned up.”

“Spoken like a man who’s never met my father.”

“I’m from Kentucky. I assure you, I’ve met somebody’s version of your father.”

I laughed despite myself.

He smiled, but didn’t press. Another point in his favor. I was keeping score now—not because I had decided he was safe, but because I had once mistaken attention for kindness and confidence for character. I wouldn’t make that mistake again.

“I’m Jace,” he said after a moment.

“Wyatt.”

“It’s nice to be met, Wyatt.”

That was an odd phrase. I liked it more than I wanted to.

I checked the time on my phone and stood. The patio shifted half an inch to the left, then righted itself. Not drunk, exactly, but farther from sober than I’d thought.

Jace rose, too, without reaching for me. “You all right?”

“I’m fine.” I took another step to prove it. Less convincing than I’d hoped. “I don’t live far. I can walk.”

“You could,” he said. “But I’d feel better if you took a car.”

My spine stiffened.

He caught it immediately. “That came out wrong. What I mean is, I can wait here while you call one. Or I can get Ariel, if you’d rather not wait with a stranger.”

There it was again: a choice instead of a command.

“How do you know Ariel?” I asked.

He didn’t seem offended by the question. “We served on the center’s fundraising board together. She designed my office, and I’ve been losing arguments to her ever since.”

Convenient answer. Also easy to check.

“Stay put,” I said.

I found Ariel in the kitchen, barefoot and attacking a wedge of brie with a butter knife.

“Jace?” she said when I asked. “Hopelessly earnest. Owns too many blue shirts. Why?”

“No reason.”

Her eyes narrowed toward the patio, then brightened with criminal speed. “Oh.”

“Don’t.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You said it with your whole face.”

I returned to find Jace exactly where I’d left him. I opened the rideshare app and entered my address with the screen angled away from him.

“Good,” he said.

“Good?”

“You checked.” He slipped his hands into his pockets. “You shouldn’t trust me yet.”

Something inside me loosened—not all the way, but enough.

The car arrived four minutes later. Jace walked me through the house but kept half a step behind. At the curb, he held out a folded scrap of paper.

“My number,” he said. “No obligation. If you’d like another quiet conversation sometime, I know a place with coffee and one deeply mediocre oak tree.”

I accepted it. Paper was different from entering his number into my phone. It let me decide later.

“Good night, Jace.”

“Good night, Wyatt.”

I verified the license plate before getting into the car. Jace noticed but said nothing. He waited beneath the porch light until we pulled away.

At home, I locked the door behind me, drank two glasses of water, and set Jace’s number on the nightstand. Tomorrow-Wyatt could decide what to do with it.

I crawled into bed expecting the usual replay: Nathan’s cologne, my father’s anger, all the moments when I should have known better.

Instead, I heard Jace saying, You shouldn’t trust me yet.

For once, caution didn’t feel like fear. It felt like something I had chosen.

I placed the scrap of paper beneath my phone and turned off the light.

The silence stayed kind.