Page 117 of What Happens at Nightfall

“Hi,” said Jess, since nothing else seemed entirely adequate.

Adam looked down at her, sitting there, cross-legged, on the floor. And then he grinned. “Do you need a hand or should I come down to you?”

It was so like Adam, to offer to meet her where she was. After years of shoving down her emotions, Jess was so awash in them, she didn’t know what to do.

Mutely, Jess held up her hands and Adam lifted her easily to her feet, folding her in his arms. Jess thought of his face turning purple; she thought of Ben with the knife; she thought of Kate, kissing Ben’s cheek, and all she could do was bury her face in Adam’s fleece, hoping the fuzzy nap would absorb the moisture so he wouldn’t realize she was crying all over him.

“Thank you,” Adam murmured into her hair.

Jess pulled back, shaking her head. “I didn’t really do much.”

“You faced off against the forces of evil. I’d say that’s something.”

“Force. One force.” The thing in her hand squeaked indignantly. Jess shoved it behind her back. Get thee behind me, Satan. “I keep thinking, if I hadn’t jumped to all sorts of conclusions, if I’d listened to Cornelia, Ben wouldn’t have come so close to . . . you know.”

“I wasn’t going to kill myself,” said Ben, but he didn’t sound entirely sure. He glanced at Jess. “He told me you were trying to steal my dad.”

She’d known that, but hearing it directly from Ben made it worse. She’d come into their lives and made Ben feel like he was losing the one parent he had left. It made Jess feel sick just to think of it.

“I couldn’t do that even if I wanted to,” said Jess quietly. “And I didn’t want to. Steal him, I mean. Just . . .”

“Just?” prompted Adam.

Borrow wasn’t the right word either. Share also sounded wrong. Jess avoided Adam’s eyes and looked directly at Ben. “You’re a family and no one will ever change that. Even if your father and I dated . . .”

“If?”

Jess took a deep breath and plunged on. “I can’t imagine my being around would ever change how he feels about you. Even if I were around.”

“You keep saying if,” said Adam.

Jess looked at him helplessly. The mausoleum felt very small, crammed with too many people and too many demons: one in a pendant and the others they carried in less obvious ways.

“I don’t want to come between you and your family.”

“Jess. Without you, I wouldn’t have my family. Without you—” Adam shook his head. “I don’t want to think about it. I don’t want to think about not having them. And I don’t want to think about not having you. It’s not like it’s one or the other. Just because I love them doesn’t mean—”

“Doesn’t mean what?” asked Jess, her throat very tight.

“It doesn’t mean that I don’t also love you.” Adam glanced guiltily at his son before looking back at Jess. “I love you. I know it’s a weird place and time to be saying it, but it would be worse not saying it.”

It’s the circumstances, she would have said a month ago. You’ll reconsider. All those years she thought her mother hadn’t wanted her, but there it had been, all along: love. So much love all around her that she’d never noticed, that she’d pushed aside, assuming it wasn’t for her.

“I love you too,” Jess croaked, and she could have sworn she heard chimes ringing as Adam took her in his arms.

As she rose up on her tiptoes to kiss him back, Jess was vaguely aware of her mother taking charge of Ben, wrapping him in lemon verbena and gentle warm fuzzies. And then she wasn’t aware of anything else at all for quite some time. Except that she was home. Here, in this crypt. Or wherever. So long as Adam’s arms were around her.

Ingrid let out a long sigh of exasperation. “You two. Get a tomb.”

“We’re in a tomb,” mumbled Jess. “Go away.”

Adam laughed softly. Jess could feel his amusement in the way his chest moved against hers. “The grave’s a fine and private place / But none, I think, do there embrace. Marvell had no idea what he was talking about.”

“Yoo-hoo!” called Ingrid.

“Much embracing, no privacy,” said Jess resignedly. “Should we tell him he got it wrong?”

“He’s been dead for three hundred and fifty years, so I think we can let it slide.” Adam leaned closer, murmuring in her ear, “Also there’s another bit in that poem that I think we should test for accuracy. Something about two hundred years to adore each breast. I mean, I think his estimate’s a little low, but we can give it a go.”