She takes about fifteen seconds. Then: "We should meet at your cabin. Not my mother's house."
"She'll notice you're out late."
"She'll figure it out." She takes a breath. "My mother likes you. She's always liked you. She's going to be insufferable about this."
"I know," I say. "Come tonight."
She looks at me for a long moment. The armor is fully gone now. I'd almost forgotten what she looks like without it.
"Okay.”
five
Grace
Hiscabinisnotwhat I expected.
I don't know what I expected — something sparse, maybe, the bachelor version of deep-woods practicality: a couch, a gun rack, dishes for one. What I find when he opens the door at nine o'clock is a house someone has been living in and caring for. Bookshelves built into the wall. A kitchen that's clearly used, copper-bottom pans hanging on hooks, a wooden cutting board worn to smooth in the center. The floors are hardwood, wide-plank, aged to a color like dark honey.
"You built these shelves?”
"Two winters ago."
I run a hand along the edge of the nearest one. The joinery is tight and clean, dovetailed corners, no gaps. "You always said you wanted to learn carpentry."
"Turns out these long winters are good for something."
He gets two glasses of water. We stand at the kitchen counter and drink them and the air in the room is doing somethingcharged and careful at the same time, like both of us know what we're here for and neither of us is interested in pretending otherwise, but also — neither of us wants to rush past this. Being here. In his space. The ten years of distance shrinking to this warm kitchen and his hands around a glass.
"I thought about you," I say. "I want you to know that. It wasn't that I stopped."
Owen sets his glass down. "Vancouver's not that far. You didn't reach out. Neither did I. That's a different thing from forgetting."
He's right. We both chose the silence. I told myself it was cleaner — a clean break, a real one, no half-measures. What it actually was: self-protection. If I didn't reach out I couldn't be told there was nothing left to reach for.
He comes around the counter.
When he cups my face in his hands the way he did at the festival the breath goes out of me in a specific way. My body knows this. It's been a decade and it knows this.
"Tell me to stop," he says, "and I will."
"If I wanted you to stop," I say, "I would have stayed at my mother's house."
He's got the flannel off me before I've got both arms out of my jacket, and I laugh — actually laugh, right against his mouth — because ten years and the man still can't wait for a zipper.
"You're impatient," I say.
"I've been patient for a decade." He gets my jacket off, drops it wherever. "That's used up."
We hit the bedroom wall before we hit the bed. His hand at the back of my neck, his mouth hard on mine, teeth catching my lower lip in a way that used to be his signature and apparently still is. I get his belt open while he works my jeans down my hips, and then we're both fighting the rest of our clothes off in the kindof graceless hurry that has nothing to do with the patience he was just bragging about.
He steps back far enough to look. Ten years of a body he doesn't have a map for anymore. I look back. Heavier through the chest than he used to be. A burn scar along one forearm, pale and old. His cock is already hard against his stomach, thick, flushed, and I remember the exact weight of it in a way that makes my mouth go dry.
"Get on the bed," he says.
I do. He kneels between my legs and doesn't waste time being reverent about it. His mouth finds my inner thigh first, works up slow, and then his tongue is flat against my clit before I've even finished getting comfortable against the pillows. I grab a fistful of the sheet.
"Owen—"
