The man—how she knows it in her gut that the person is a man, she does not know—

perhaps it’s his quiet, masculine huff upon entering the house, perhaps it’s the curt scruffs of his shoes as he stalks closer and closer to where she’s detained, perhaps it’s his strong cologne that makes her eyes water immediately when he slipped into her room.

—the man is standing by her bedside, staring down on her. His calloused fingers trail a burning path on her arm, and finally rests heavily against the pulse at the crook of her neck.