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“I know you’re new to dating, but the kind of kiss I want to give you is more of a third date kind of kiss.”
My eyes pop wide. “This is a date?”
“Fuck no.”
“Oh.”
“I don’t date.”
“You do date. You date those girls. And you were just on one.”
“What I do with those girls isn’t dating.”
“Then what is it?”
“It’s something that I won’t be doing with you,” he says, his voice tight.
“W-why not?”
“Because you deserve to be dated.”
“I —”
“You deserve to be taken out, and not to greasy fast food places. To be wooed with patience and focus. You deserve to be looked at with reverence.”
At this, he does look at me like that.
With reverence.
But with something else too.
Something edgy and dangerous.
Possession.
I think I’m imagining that look but then he says his next words and proves me right.
“And with the intent that if anyone looks at you or even thinks about looking at you, they’ll lose both their eyes and most of their teeth.” Then, “You deserve to be possessed and then cherished, Meadow. Like a treasure. And I don’t do that.”
“Why not?” I ask again, my heart both pounding and twisting in my chest.
“Because I have done it before.” He shakes his head once. “And it isn’t worth it.”
Sophie’s mom.
I know he’s talking about Sophie’s mom.
I don’t even know the name of that woman, let alone what she did or what happened between them, and yet I can sense that whatever it was, was bad.
“So again, I want you to take my advice and put your coat back on. Save yourself from a man who has things to confess and warn you about.”
At his words, I spring up from my seat.
I set the hot chocolate that I think has gone all cold now down on the coffee table.
But instead of going to the coat rack, which stands by the front door and where I hung my coat, I go to him. To his end of the couch, and when I get there, I bend down. I put my hands on his shoulders and I swear my skin both sings and sighs in relief.
In joy.
