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“You wish what?” I suddenly need to hear what he has to say.
Frowning, he bows his head. “Never mind. Night, Gems.”
I hear him descend the stairs. Theclank, clank, clankas he gets farther and farther away. In a moment, he’ll be gone—I panic.
“Wait!”
I scramble to my feet, flip on the light, and peer down the staircase just as Dax reaches the bottom. “Don’t go!”
“It’s late, Gems. We both should get to bed.”
“You can’t go yet.” He can’t. Because Stuart. Because he never did finish that last thought. Because…
“Do you need something else?” he asks.
An excuse. A reason for him to stay.
“We never finished the spell.”
I descend the stairs with a composure and grace I didn’t know was in me.
“I know I stopped it before, but I really think we should complete it. Start tomorrow with a new leaf, right?”
His eyes flick to the door, but he nods. “If that’s what you want.”
I don’t have the birthday candle. Or the yarn, or even the chicken. “Maybe we just try picking up where we left off?”
There’s no need to explain which step that was.
Dax nods and steps toward me as I squeeze my eyes shut and wait.
This is a bad idea. This is a terrible idea. This is the worst idea I have ever had and—
Dax’s lips are on mine.
It’s a simple kiss. No tongue and he lingers for only a moment, but it’s nothing like I expected. His lips are velvet soft, and I catch a whiff of mint as he presses them to mine, and I am overcome with this strange sense that I’ve remembered something I didn’t know I’d forgotten.
“How’s the heart?” he whispers, his hands still cupping my chin.
I don’t know. It’s tired. It’s drunk. It’s worried everything is going to change.
“Still a little broken, I think.”
Dax doesn’t say a word. And even though my eyes are closed,I can sense that he’s still close. The solid, steady presence that’s been an anchor for the past four years of my life.
“Get some rest. I’ll call you in the morning.”
I feel him step away. When I finally open my eyes, Dax is already halfway across the room, reaching for my front door.
I’m left standing in my kitchen, wondering if I’m going to wake up tomorrow morning and regret all of it.
Chapter 4
Even before Iopen my eyes, I know that something is off.
It’s not the throbbing pain that stretches between my temples or the way my stomach churns unless I lay absolutely still. It’s the smell—AXE body spray and bacon—that alerts me to the fact that I am not in my own bed.
I crack open one eye, followed by the other. Sunlight streams in from a big bay window, illuminating a room that looks sparsely furnished on purpose. My naked butt is sprawled in the center of a California king covered in a cotton sheet so soft I estimate it took at least a thousand Egyptian threads to make it. It’s raining. No—someone is showering.
