The night was no longer still after the brick through the window. Georgia had immediately called her fellow officers that were on night shift, and within ten minutes, there were red and blue lights and sirens in the driveway.

"Don't forget your school things and toothbrush," Jeremy said hurriedly as he poked his head into CeCe's room. He disappeared just as quickly.

CeCe nodded to herself since he was already gone, presumably to check that Logan was also not forgetting to pack important things or help Flynn pack and make sure underwear made it into the suitcase before videogames did.

"Do you need some help?"

CeCe glanced over her shoulder to find Logan standing in her doorway. "No, I think I'm good. Just doing some final checks to make sure I have what I'll need for a few days."

Georgia and Jeremy had, of course, quickly decided that an ominous message taped to a brick that was thrown through their living room window was a bad sign. As if CeCe needed anything else to worry about, they had pointed out that this meant someone connected with the original break-in was able to track them to their new house and was not afraid of repeated offenses. And Georgia hadn't said it out loud, but CeCe guessed what she was thinking. If they had a suspect in custody, who was this person throwing bricks through people's windows? The real culprit? A relative or friend of the culprit? And, if they went to these lengths to tell her mom to stop investigating the break-in, did that mean there was more to the story than a simple robbery?

All these questions just buzzed around CeCe's head, and it made her sick. It meant that she couldn't get past what had happened that night because it was still happening. Whoever had attacked their house had just brought all those feelings of fear and anxiety back to be fresh in CeCe's mind.

Not only that, but because of the brick, Georgia and Jeremy had decided to move the family to a motel for a few days. This made the second time a home had now been made to feel unsafe to CeCe, and now they were running. Now, she had to spend the night in a cramped motel room. And, she knew there was no way Georgia or Jeremy would allow her and Logan to share the same bed. They didn't know he snuck in every night around one in the morning to join her and comfort her when she inevitably woke to nightmares. No, despite them knowing she needed help with coping with the past events, they would not understand that. They would worry there was something going on between the step-siblings. And, well, given what had happened just before the shattered window, maybe they would have been perfectly right in worrying.

"Are you ok?"

"I said I'm just doing final checks," CeCe said, sweeping a piece of her hair behind her ear as her gaze swept over the contents of her suitcase.

"No," Logan said, and suddenly he was standing right behind her. His arms slipped around her waist. "I meant, are you feeling alright?"

CeCe desperately wanted to lean back against him or hide her face against his chest. But the muffled voices of the police officers and their parents in the living room just a few quick strides away made her uneasy.

She pulled out of his arms and turned to face him. "Yeah, I'm fine." She was totally not fine. She felt like the brick from the living room had lodged itself between her stomach and her ribs. Her chest also felt fragile, almost as if she took too deep of a breath, her ribs might shatter like glass.

Logan raised an eyebrow. "Ok. Well, I just wanted to check. And, I thought maybe we also need to talk."

"About what?" CeCe asked as she turned back to her suitcase. She mumbled something to herself and then turned and pulled open the drawer of her nightstand. She retrieved the bottle of sleeping pills and tucked them in between a set of pajamas.

"That kiss."

CeCe froze. Their house had just been attacked. Their family had been threatened. And he wanted to talk about the kiss? Right now? "Um, maybe we should just forget it happened."

"Why? Didn't you-"

"No. Just stop. Whatever you're going to say, don't." CeCe huffed and put her hands on her hips as she glared at him. "Just forget it."

Logan's forehead creased as he frowned. "You just want to forget it. Well what about the past few weeks? Us getting closer? You laying your head on my chest? Me being in your bed?"

CeCe's eyes darted toward the open door. "Shh. Stop it. Whatever either of us might have been feeling, we have to forget it. It's not right."

"CeCe, it's not like it's incest. We aren't related." He took a step closer to her, and she took an equal one back.

She swallowed. She wanted to be with him, but there was too much going on. There was too much at risk. She wanted to somehow get past all these horrible memories of both break-ins, and she knew she couldn't do that without Logan. If their parents knew or even suspected something romantic was going on between them, they might decide to separate them. And CeCe couldn't handle the isolation from Logan. The only way to ensure she could still have his company was for their relationship to remain platonic. Couldn't Logan see that?

CeCe shook her head. "Mom and Jeremy wouldn't see it that way, and you know that."

"We don't have to tell them. We could just try it."

"Try what?" CeCe snapped. Her pulse was pounding, and her hands felt shaky. Tears pricked at the corners of her eyes. "How do you think this will go exactly? We eventually either break up and hate each other and everything's awkward at home or it works and we spend years sneaking around until we go to college. And then we'd still have to tell people."

Logan nodded after a minute. "Not everything is as black and white or clean cut like that. What do you want right now in this moment? I don't want to know about what the future CeCe wants. I want to know what you want right now. We can figure out all the rest later."

CeCe shrugged. "I want to not be scared of every shadow. I want to not be scared of closing my eyes for fear of nightmares of you dying over and over and over. So, can you just drop this? I need you here as a friend and brother first. If you really want to talk about...that kiss...it'll have to wait. Because I can't handle life being more complicated than it is right now, ok?!"

At some point as she spoke, tears had started rolling down CeCe's face. Now, she swiped at them furiously, mumbling something about how Logan and she should focus on finishing packing for the motel.

But instead of leaving, Logan stepped forward and pulled her into his arms. His hand cupped the back of her head, holding her head gently to his shoulder as if he were encouraging her to not hold back her tears. "Ok," he said quietly into her ear. "I'll forget it happened. For now. And I'll help you as much as I can in other ways."

He pressed a soft kiss to her jaw and then was gone.

Uh, hey guys. I know this update is totally out of the blue. I was up late last night and was reading through some old stories on different fanfic accounts of mine. I ran across this one, and I just became super inspired to write this chapter. Anyways, I know it's been three and a half years since an update, so I rather expect this chapter will just be shouting into a void. But, regardless, here's the very very late update a lot of you wanted years ago. My apologies.