Page 87 of Old Flames

“Tell me how it ends,” he insisted. “Do Azealia and Nicholas stay together?”

“That’s so expected!”

“You’re not planning on breaking them up, are you?” he asked, almost accusatory. “Not after all they’ve been through!”

“Spare me the outrage. You can’t be that invested!”

“I’m fully invested,” he said. “I’ve been holding it back because I don’t want to scare you.”

“I’m not scared, Leo. I’m skeptical.”

“I can smell fear,” he said, sniffing her neck. “Despite your claws, you’re nothing but a frightened kitten.”

“What exactly am I afraid of? I missed that part.”

“My feelings for you,” he replied. “I’m obsessed with your thoughts, your words, your moods, your silences. I’m a man obsessed, and it’s no longer an option for me to hide it from you.”

“Lucky for you, I love being worshipped.”

“Come on, tell me.”

“Fine! I’ll tell you but you won’t like it.”

“I’m all ears.”

“Azealia learns that the jolly wizard at the portal, the one she struck the deal with, is a devil. There was always a price to pay, and that price is her soul.”

“So she dies,” he said flatly.

“The novel opens in 1990, the start of her final decade. She will die at midnight, December 31, 1999, playing into the Y2K hysteria.”

“You’re right. I don’t like it.”

“You of all people should appreciate a nuanced ending.”

“If I’m going to follow the love story of two lost souls over the course of three books, I don’t want nuance. I want a happy ending.”

She reached under the sheets and stroked him. “I can give you one of those.”

“You might have to, to get me over my disappointment.”

“Leo!” Jules cried, panicked. “She and Nicolas can’t live happily ever after. It wouldn’t be realistic.”

“And time travel is? And deals with the devil? And all the other stuff Azealia did?”

“I hear you, but I don’t want a sweet and syrupy ending.”

“That’s another way of saying you don’t want happiness.”

“I’m not Azealia,” she reminded him.

“Give them a happy ending,” he insisted. “It’s what the fans want. I know because I’m a fan. You already killed Malachi. You’ve done enough damage.”

“I had to kill him!” The death of Azealia’s first love, Malachi, had earned her the ire of thousands of readers. “‘Someone has to die in order that the rest of us should value life more.’”

He groaned. “Don’t quote Virginia Woolf before coffee.”

“I can’t help it. I pray to Woolf every morning.”