Page 129 of The Route to You

He blinked at her, pulling the palette back from his chest to reveal a wide smear of colored paints across his chest, almost rainbow style, but without the magic. “What are you doing?” he asked, bewildered.

“Painting a mural,” she said with a contented smile. “Obviously.”

“At two thirty in the morning?”

She climbed down from the stool. “I’m sorry. Did I wake you?” She crossed the room for a roll of paper towels.

“No, that was the smell of cookies.”

Sloan shrugged. “Yeah, I got hungry.” She ripped off a sheet of paper towel and came toward him, dabbing at some of the excess paint.

“Well, did you burn yourself?”

That made her give him a confused look. “Huh?”

He pointed at the bandage. “How’d you get hurt?”

“Oh.” She smiled, almost dreamily now. “I got a tattoo.”

A what?

As she swiped more paint, leaving an even larger smear on his chest, he caught her wrist, forcing her to still and look up at him. “Are you drunk?” he asked, searching her gaze.

“No . . .” Her mouth curved in a slight frown. “I mean I had a couple of glasses of wine before the tattoo, but that’s definitely worn off by now. I’m just happy. Alive.”

Happy. Alive.

He stared at her. What the hell provoked this?

“I think I need to put some water on that,” Sloan said, her gaze going back to his chest. She pulled her wrist back, but his grip didn’t loosen.

“What’s going on?” he asked, giving her a hard stare.

Sloan looked like she might deflect it with a joke. That’s how it had been for them the last few weeks. Smiles, light tone, something breezy to keep things comfortable. Humor as a shield. They hadn’t touched on what they’d spoken about the night he left Tara’s unicorn at the paint shop, but they also hadn’t needed to.

With the air cleared between them, there was nothing else to say, although it still rankled him, knowing that Evan Tipton was unscrupulous and had gotten away with all his lies. The fuck had even made complete lies out of thin air. And he’s a future leader of the American people . . . God help us all.

Things were good with Sloan, but Kyle had definitely wondered if the attraction was all one-sided. Sure, she slept better with him there, but that might not be him , just a presence. After all, she had been in a long-term relationship. So, he’d forced himself to lose himself in his goal of getting a new show off the ground.

Sloan’s gaze flicked past him, toward the half-finished mural, toward the riot of color climbing the wall like something alive. “I went and did something stupid. Maybe brave. I haven’t finished making my mind up about it yet.”

Kyle loosened his grip just enough for her to slip her wrist free, suddenly aware of how close they stood—bare feet on the hardwood, her paint-splattered toes inches from his, her breath still faintly sweet with cinnamon.

“You look wired.”

She huffed out a quiet laugh. “That’s probably more accurate.” She reached up and, after a beat of hesitation, peeled back the edge of the bandage on her arm. Just enough to show him dark, clean lines beneath, still a little red around the edges.

The silhouettes of small birds in flight, the larger ones toward the bottom, like you might see them from the earth. “Delilah drew it for me. I just wanted something that felt . . . free.”

“Did she put you up to it?”

Her honey-colored eyes flickered with hesitation, as though bracing for his judgment. She seemed to calm, as he smoothed his thumb over the sore skin with admiration, releasing a soft exhale. “No. I mean, sort of. But not in the way that makes it something I didn’t want to do. She just challenged me to make a list of all the things I’ve always wanted to do and never did—not big-bucket list things like climbing Mount Everest. The small things.” Her eyes sparkled again. “And I was so excited when I got home, I just wanted to start some of them immediately.”

He could see in her face how much she loved the tattoo. How happy she was.

He couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen her this happy, actually. Not in the last few weeks. Not in Breckenridge. Not even when they’d been dating . . . toward the end. Especially not when they ended their relationship, but she had just lost her mom.

“So, you decided to paint a mural at two in the morning?” he said dryly, a light chuckle in his voice.