Page 8 of Sparks with the Firefighter

If Vivien is going to stand in front of this town with her hand in mine, then let them all look. Let them all decide it's real.

Because there's nothing fake about it on my end.

She's mine. She just hasn't been told yet.

CHAPTER SIX VIVIEN

Drew leaves with his father who is more than an hour late for the pickup. But at least he showed, that’s progress I suppose. Thoran and I have stepped into the next part of our obligation, the dreaded photo shoot.

The photographer has us on a stump for forty minutes.

Not just any stump, it’s the stump. It’s the massive cedar round they haul out for every event in this town. It’s sanded, shellacked and hung with plaid bunting. There's a crowd, of course. Jules is directing from six feet back with a coffee in each hand and no intention of drinking either one.

"Closer," she calls. "Vivien, honey, you're standing next to him like he's a coworker."

"He is a coworker, remember,” I mumble. It’s taking everything in me not to lose myself in the moment.

"Closer," she insists.

“I’m on it.” Thoran puts his hands on me and I melt under the heat of his touch.

One hand is at my waist, spread wide, with a thumb along the bottom of my ribs. The other comes up and moves my hair off my shoulder like he's done it a hundred times before, like it's his to move. I feel the heat everywhere. The shutter goes and Jules coos with delight. Thoran turns me a few degrees into the light. The shutter goes again.

"Perfect," the photographer says. "Now laugh at something."

"I don't know what to laugh at," I say. “This is so not my skill set.”

Thoran leans down and says something into my ear that is not remotely appropriate for a family festival. I laugh so hard I have to grab his forearm to stay on the stump.

Click.

"That's the one," Jules says, delighted. "That's the poster. Adios AI Lumberjack Lovers."

“We’re done then?” I ask.

“Not even close, maybe a little more serious now.”

It goes on. Thoran puts a hand into the back of my hair and pins my head to that perfect spot on his chest. Somebody wants us with the axe. Somebody shouts for Thoran to lift me. He does it in one effortless swoop.

By the time the photographer starts changing lenses again, Thoran's hand has settled at the small of my back. My whole body has quietly stopped pretending to be surprised about it. He dips his head. His mouth is at my temple.

"Come on. Let's get out of here."

"Wait, did they say? I think we're not done⁠—"

"We're done." His lip curls at the corner.

Thoran pulls me in against his side and we slip out the back door of the arena into the loading corridor. He makes another turn and all of a sudden we’re in the alley behind it. The noise cuts off to a distant hum.

It's cooler back here. Green and damp with a lagoon smell that comes up strong between the buildings. There's a stack of pallets, somebody's forgotten sawhorse, and a strip of sky going gold above the roofline.

I put my back against the block wall and press my hands flat to it.

"Okay," I breathe. "Okay."

He doesn't crowd me. Thoran leans on the opposite wall with his arms crossed and gives me the whole width of the alley, and somehow that's worse.

"You want to sit down?"