She blinked back tears. “My idea of love,” she said. “The one that says it has to look like suffering, that I have to be broken for it to matter.”
The flame shot higher.
A glass on the counter trembled. Her plants leaned toward the sigil like pulled by gravity. The air itself grew heavy, as if it were holding its breath.
The sigil glowed beneath her palm.
Her voice cracked. “If I lose him again, I lose him, but I want him back. Not because I need him, because I chose him.”
Silence.
Then:
A sound outside.
Three sharp knocks.
BANG. BANG. BANG.
She sat bolt upright, heart rabbit-punching her ribs.
“It’s not Halloween yet!” she barked, voice raw from too many silent hours.
BANG. BANG. BANG.
She grabbed the bat, actual wood, cracked from a summer softball league she never finished, and crept to the door barefoot.
She threw it open, ready to swing.
And stopped.
Ashar stood there, framed in the doorway like temptation with a costume budget. Wearing red. Not a shirt, and definitely not subtle. Red like sin. Likestatement. A leather jacket that clung to his shoulders like temptation. Tight pants, fangs for flair, fake dollar-store horns, curled and gleaming, crowned his head. A stuffed tail flicked lazily behind him like punctuation. He looked every inch the devil he was rumored to be, and still unmistakably him.
He grinned like mischief incarnate.
She didn’t believe it at first. Her brain tried to fill in the blanks: a cruel prank, a dream, a hallucination dressed in red. But then he looked at her. And it was him.
“Miss me?”
Her throat locked. Her knees nearly followed.
“It’s Devil’s Night,” he said, stepping inside. His boots echoed off the hardwood. “Seemed appropriate.”
She swallowed. “But you left.”
“I had to,” he said, quieter now. “The magic pulled me back. But it didn’t break.”
She frowned. “Why not?”
Ashar took her hand, pressing it to his chest, solid and warm, yet impossible.
“The magic changed,” he said softly. “What started as a summons born of need has grown into something else. Love. That’s not a need, it’s a choice. The magic couldn’t unmake it, because it was never part of the original deal.”
Blair’s breath caught.
“You changed the terms,” he finished, voice like dusk and vows. “Without even realizing it.”
Her eyes stung.
