It was frigid with winter, and I felt increasingly stupid in my dress. Occasionally people glanced at me as they went inside. I tugged at the hem again and shifted on the heels Lithie forced on me.
Do I go in? What did I say? I wasn’t even sure of his name. Oh god, I hadn’t mapped this out enough. What if he was already sitting down and I was supposed to go inside? Or what if I was supposed to stay out here?—
A low, dark voice cut through my thinking. “Bibliomaniac?”
chapter
eighteen
SHAY
C wasintimidatinglyattractive. I wasn’t sure how else to describe it. Graham had been handsome in a good-boy way. Everything about this guy radiated power—though there was a slight lift to his lips, a softness that dulled the edge of him, like he’d wrapped a blade in fabric so I could hold it.
He kicked off the wall.
Fuck.
I remembered he’d been tall at Tropes, but even in the four-inch heels my sister had forced on me, he still towered. Tattoos snaked from the charcoal-gray sleeve of his suit, down his wrists and over his hands.
Bighands.
That were…dusted in some white powder? Weird.
More tattoos clawed their way up the side of his neck, and they gave his suit a sawtooth edge, like the fabric was barely restraining the power of him.
There was something about him that screamed jock, too, like he could have played water polo or some equally posh sport in college. Those boys all had the same unseriousness—which seemed like it should be at odds with the subtle hum of something dark vibrating off him.
But, nonetheless, it was there in the playful pout of his lips.
And his body definitely belonged to an athlete.
He tilted his head, something unreadable in his eyes, and I realized I’d been staring.
I swallowed. “Nice to meet you.” I held out my hand to him. His eyes sharpened, amused.
He took my hand in his, shaking it. “Calder.”
Calder.
The sound fit him, the sharpCand the way theRseemed to disappear into a growl.
He wasgrown.My sister’s words echoed in my head. He was only a few years older than my ex, but there was something infinitely more mature about him. Grounded.
He didn’t look overdressed or uncomfortable in a suit. Like this was just how he got out of bed.
Calder stepped closer, not letting go of my hand.
“Do you have a name? Or should I call you Maniac?”
Need to know you can fit all of me, my little Maniac.
I blinked, trying to repress Void’s words.
“Oh, um…”Shit. “Yes. It’s Shay, actually. Short for Asherah.” Not sure why I told him that, as I spent the majority of my time pretending my mother hadn’t given me a name that also belonged to a millennia-old long-forgotten goddess and divine feminine counterpart to Yahweh.
“Asherah.” He repeated my name in a growl that settled in my bones. “It suits you.”
I stared into his deep, midnight-blue eyes, and for the first time I didn’t hate my name.
