"Tell me how I can help you."

Emily took a breath. Her voice was quiet, but steady. “Tell me how I can help you.”

Eli’s head tilted, just slightly. Then his mouth twisted into something bitter and broken. He gave a dry, humorless laugh.

“You really don’t get it,” he muttered. “You don’t get any of this.”

She didn’t move. Didn’t answer.

So he exploded.

“I didn’t do anything!” he shouted, pacing now. “I didn’t touch you, didn’t say anything, didn’t even think anything—I just walked into a library aisle and saw—”

He stopped. Looked at her like it hurt to keep going.

“—tits. I saw a woman’s fucking tits. That’s it.”

Emily flinched—but not for the reason he thought. Her face warmed slightly. Her hand drifted, almost unconsciously, to the collar of her blouse.

Eli kept going. “You were gorgeous. Of course I stared. What was I supposed to do—applaud and walk away? It wasn’t a crime. I was just… shocked. I didn’t ask for it. I didn’t plan it. I’d never even—”

He stopped again, this time flushing with embarrassment.

Emily raised her eyebrows gently. “You’d never what?”

He stared at her for a long second. Then, almost spitting:

“I’d never even seen a woman naked in real life before that. Not once.”

That silence returned. Thicker now.

“And now?” he added bitterly. “Now, if that ever happens again… if someone ever undresses in front of me, even on purpose—you know what I’ll think about first?”

He didn’t wait for her to answer.

“Cops. Holding cells. Some drunk guy with a tattoo breaking my lip open because he thought I was some kind of perv.”

Emily’s throat tightened.

“I wanted to remember what that moment felt like,” Eli said, quieter now but not calmer. “But it’s gone. It’s never going to be anything except terrifying and humiliating.”

He turned his back to her. Ran a hand through his hair. His shoulders shook slightly.

Emily stood there, unsure whether to step forward or stay still.

But deep down…
Somewhere very deep down…

She couldn’t lie to herself.

Part of her was flattered.

Not just that he’d looked. But that, in the middle of everything, with the bruise swelling over his eye and his lip cracked open—he still called her gorgeous.

Still remembered that.