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“Wow. I choose a random thing, and you’re all ready and willing to make it about you. Guess what, Cohen ... not everything I do or say is about you. The sooner you realize that, the better.”

He blinked at her, still trying to catch his breath after hearing Alana say his name.

Cohen.

It wasn’t a very common first name, but he liked it. It suited him, but never before this moment had he thought of his name as something sexy or as something that a woman could say to make him lose his mind.

Obviously, the woman who would challenge that would be Alana fucking Wixx. She of the candles and magic.

She of the green eyes and red hair.

She who so often haunted his dreams.

She, who seconds before, had asked him for a truce.

Cohen was fucked, and he knew it. There was no way he would be able to keep up with this truce for very long. He didn’t have that much control.

FOUR

ALANA

Alana couldn’t believe it. She had actually managed to ask Cohen Pierce for a ceasefire on their feud, and the damn man had agreed. Mason was his brother, and it would only make sense that he wouldn’t want to ruin his sibling’s wedding.

But Alana didn’t like that Cohen had been so quick to listen to her idea. So quick to agree to end their own personal little war.

She kept on replaying their conversation in the diner together, but no matter how many times she ran it over in her head, she couldn’t find the lie in Cohen’s eyes.

He meant it.

They were officially in a truce.

And the best ... or worse ... of it all was that Lila and Mason were not the only ones who would be benefiting from this.

The whole town would, especially now that Alana was on the council with Cohen. There was no doubt in anyone’s mind that Cohen and Alana were likely to rip each other to shreds in a town council meeting, but they would get one hell of a surprise when Alana shoutedpuffed-up rooster, quickly followed by Cohen shootingcarwash.

The whole of Half Moon Key would probably think that they had lost their damn minds.

Alana looked deep into her crystal ball, hoping to see something ... anything ... in the reflective surface. There was nothing. There was never a single thing in the crystal ball for her to see. It was her grandmother’s favored tool, but Alana herself didn’t have the psychic abilities of her Nana. Even her mother didn’t have that kind of power.

A loud knock jarred her out of her thoughts, and she shook her head. When the sound resounded again, Alana looked up.

“Huh. There is someone at the door.” She glanced at the clock. The storefront had closed at five, and no one ever knocked. It was too early for Lila to be tearing down the door too. Alana was supposed to meet her at her house later for a whole lot of wedding stuff, but that wasn’t for another couple of hours.

Alana got to her feet, kicking her high-heeled sandals under the little table where the crystal ball sat. The thick carpet felt nice under her toes, and she sighed on her way out from behind the curtain and into her store.

From her vantage point, she couldn’t yet tell who stood behind the door, but she could tell that it was a man. A tall man with square shoulders and a hard-cut jaw.

Sheknewthat man.

With a grunt, she unlocked the door and threw it open. “Justwhatare you doing here?” she snapped.

Cohen Pierce stood there, grinning at her in his tight jeans and plaid shirt. Usually, he wore a sheriff’s tan button-down, but he had replaced it with a different shirt ... one that played tricks with the color of his eyes. His scruff was neatly trimmed too. The man was trying to make a good impression, but she wasn’t sure for who orwhy.

It bothered her, but only because it made her belly flutter and her breath to become short. She took a deep breath in the hopes of clearing her thoughts from Cohen’s new attire, but it only served to fill her head and lungs with the pine scent that he trailed behind him.

Does he have to smell like my favorite candle?The big jerk.

“What are you doing here?” she snapped, completely forgetting the truce that they had only just agreed on that afternoon.