Page 314 of Sorrow & Strangers

Alice lifts her eyebrows, looking almost impressed. “And Annwn is still standing? Whoa.”

I roll my eyes.

“Don’t you find it, like . . . wildly hot that you have no idea who he is?”

I exhale. “It is, and it isn’t.”

Alice shakes her head in disbelief. “Being able to fuck and not know if you see him every day, not having to say hi or care about his feelings, is a dream scenario to me.”

“I do want to, believe me. I want him,” I clarify. That definitely isn’t the problem. “But I know we should wait.”

“Wait for what?”

“For him to tell me who he is.”

“Booo! Anonymous sex is hot,” Alice scoffs.

“He doesn’t want anonymous sex,” I say, and neither do I, though there are times that I want to say fuck it and have him blindfold me before having his way with me.

Alice boos more.

“He wants commitment.”

“Even noncorporeal men are the worst,” Alice hisses.

“He did help in Drãculea.”

Alice shakes her head. “And you didn’t even have we almost died sex.”

“Well, I passed out.”

“Have you guys done anything?” Alice asks, lifting an eyebrow.

My cheeks heat.

“Ohhhh. So, everything else?”

“Not everything,” I say. “We’ve . . . humped . . .” I grimace at the word.

“You’re dry humping your stalker?” Alice cackles.

“Sometimes . . . wet,” I say with a blush, the word slipping out.

“Wet humping is a grim term,” Alice says with a distressed groan.

“I don’t know what else to call it!”

Alice’s nose wrinkles. “Wet humping is worse than unpenetrate.”

“Well”—I shrug—“add it to my legacy.”

“These epitaphs are going to look great on our shared gravestone.”

“You’re planning on dying?” I ask, glaring at her.

“No, but if I’m going, you’re coming with me,” she says. “And I’m talking extinction-level event where we accidentally read the book of the dead and awaken the old gods or something, and they smite us.”

I laugh because it sounds completely plausible. I check the clock and sigh. “I have to go. I have an exam in twenty minutes.”