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“You’re unique, but are not self-absorbed to flaunt it. You’re kind to others, not out of duty, but from a warm heart. You’ve experienced enough sadness in your life that it should leave you broken, although you’re strong enough to push on. You’re beautiful and yet appear to have never been told that. And one thing I know for sure is you’re exactly the type of woman I’d spend the rest of my life trying to make happy.”
I smacked my face again. “I’m dreaming, right?” I glanced around and looked for a unicorn or something out of the ordinary that would confirm I was asleep. “Yes, this is a dream.”
Kipp laughed, a deep rumble. “If you were dreaming, I’d be fucking you.” I blushed up to my hairline. He grazed his fingers along my cheekbone to leave an ice cold trail in its wake. “I do love that I can make you blush.”
I shook my head, so confused. “I’m not dreaming?”
He trailed his finger along my lips, where I licked out at the frigid contact. “No, you’re not.” His eyes filled with deep regret. “I’m sorry that I upset you.”
I sighed. “I don’t even know what upset me.”
“Of course you do,” he countered. “It’s because you’re trying to fight against the feelings you have for me.”
My blush deepened. “I-I…”
He continued to run the frosty tip of his finger along my heated cheeks. “When I saw Zach kiss you,” his eyes became distressed, “it created anger in me I’ve never known.”
“That’s why you’ve been acting the way you have? You were mad about the kiss?”
“Not just because he kissed you, but knowing I never could.” He ran the chill of his finger back to my lips, where he stopped, touching my bottom lip with his gaze focused there. “Because you see, Tess, I’m sure I’ve already fallen in love with you.”
Tears welled up in my eyes and I had no strength to stop them. “You have?”
He nodded. “I certainly have.”
“But we can’t do this.” I stated the obvious, no matter how much my heart rejoiced at the moment. “You’re a ghost.”
He smiled. “It’s not the best of circumstances, no. But it can’t be a coincidence that the only one who can help me in this situation happens to be the woman who could destroy my bachelor ways.”
“Oh…” I hadn’t even considered what he suggested as a possibility, “so you think you needed to experience an attraction to me to cross over?”
It’d never occurred to me that meeting him could’ve been more than just my helping him solve the case. Did he stay around because he wanted to experience love as he never had before? Is that what kept him stuck here? Did it have nothing to do with Hannah at all?
“It’s the only thing I can come up with. The coincidence of it is too great.” He winked. “Cops don’t believe in coincidences.”
If anything, hearing this made my heart pitter-patter. Finding true love had meant so much to him, he couldn’t cross over. He might have been way off here—this might still revolve around Hannah—but I liked the fantasy too much to not indulge myself in thinking he was right. But acknowledging that made a thought rise. “Are you telling me this now so I can help you?”
“No,” he said sharply.
“Why, then, why now?”
His gaze softened in a way I’d never seen from the arrogant Kipp. His stare became warm and declared what he told me now was nothing but the truth. “Your tears made me fess up.”
“My tears?”
He continued to dance his finger along my cheek, creating little pings in my body, which made my senses alive. “Your true feelings showed tonight.”
“Which were…?”
“Longing, frustration, anger—everything I experienced in my own heart.”
This should have made me happy, but it didn’t. He’d put me through hell. “If you felt that way, why didn’t you say something sooner?”
He looked at me knowingly. “I’m a ghost.”
Yes, he was, but it didn’t matter, not to me. Although the simple reply had answered my question. “You were hesitant, like me.”
He nodded.
