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“Zev,” I whisper, wiggling until I’m resting in the crook of his right arm, right against his side, my hand over the rose on his chest. He wraps his arm around me, keeping me close.

“Am I too gruesome to kiss?” he mutters.

I press my face into his side and breathe in his soap and cologne. Yum. Zevulun Hayes is dangerous when he’s high on Benadryl. If I kiss him like this, who knows what might happen. “Yes, you are much too gruesome.”

His chest rumbles with a laugh, and I stretch my neck and peck his jaw. His arm about me tightens, somehow hugging me closer.

“This is so fast,” I say, but I don’t attempt to move. That hard-as-a-rock man is quite the comfortable cushion.

“No,” he says.

“Except that it is.”

His lips and nose nuzzle at the top of my head and into my hair. “Not fast enough.”

I pinch his side, but he doesn’t even flinch. “You don’t even know what you’re saying. You’re stoned on Benadryl.”

His breaths are even and steady, and for a second I think he’s asleep.

“I love you, Rosalie.” His words might be slow and slurred, but I don’t miss a single beat.

Every muscle in my body tenses. “You don’t,” I whisper.

“Except I do.”

“Shh.” I tilt my head and peek up at him. “Sleep off a little of that drug. Okay?” I pat his chest, not unlike a soothing parent would a sick child. “Before you say something you regret.”

A minute later, a soft humming snore sounds from his throat. He’s finally asleep. But I am wide awake, nestled in the crook of his arm. My hand on that rose tattoo beats with the thump of his heart.

I love you, Rosalie.

He said it so clearly. So sweetly. So earnestly.

He also said it while drugged.

Still, it took Robert a year to tell me he loved me. And Zev only a month. And sure, he’s a little out of his mind, and under normal conditions, I doubt he would have said it. But he did. And I can’t unhear it.

Thirty-Eight

TEN MONTHS BEFORE THE ACCIDENT

Fran’s warm cheese dip has gone cold. Callum’s poker table with our friends seated all around it has gone quiet. Until⁠—

“Rosalie!” Fran, standing directly behind a focused Rose, shakes her shoulders. “You have to win this for women everywhere.”

My best friend’s wife is spirited–no doubt.

Rosalie tips her head up to see her friend and gives her a wry smile. “Okay, but I won’t be able to lay my cards down if you’ve turned me into a milkshake.”

Maggie and Stella hum out a laugh, but they’re watching intently too. It’s down to me and Rose. Everyone else is out. My girl and I are the only ones with chips left. We’ve been playing Texas Hold’em for the last four hours. That’s what happens when Coach gives us a long weekend. It’s now two o’clock in the morning, we’re sleep deprived and delirious.

“Do it for the team.” Lucca slaps me on the back.

“It’s not as if he can change his cards now,” Maggie tells him.

Rose pushes the rest of her chips into the center of the table. “All in.”

Fran squeals. “Just tell me you have something good,” she says, shaking Rosalie once more.