Page 82 of Mystic's Sunrise

Then I turned and walked out the door.

Didn’t look back.

Didn’t let myself.

Because if I did…I’d never leave.

And I needed space to think. To breathe. To figure out how the hell I was going to tell her that the man she gave herself to last night…was a fraud. She wasn’t asking yet. But she would, and when she did…

I better be ready to lose her.

CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

THE WOOD CREAKEDbeneath our feet as we walkedout onto the dock, the morning sun spilling gold across the water. The air smelled like salt and fresh earth, and I breathed it in deep.

Lucy didn’t speak right away. She just sat down, legs dangling over the edge, her boots untied and swinging. I sat slower, careful, the way I always moved now, but it didn’t hurt as much anymore. Not outside.

Inside... that was different.

“You look lighter,” she said after a moment, giving me a sideways glance. Her lips curved, that knowing smirk just barely there. “Did something happen last night?”

My cheeks warmed instantly. I turned my face to the water, watching the way the ripples caught the sun like a mirror trying to blind me.

I nodded. “Yes.” My voice was quiet, soft, remembering. “Something happened.”

She waited. Didn’t press. Lucy never did. She just gave me the space, the silence, the understanding.

“I thought I would be afraid,” I said, my fingers twisting the hem of my sweater. “That... when it came time, I would freeze. That my body would remember before my heart could feel.”

Lucy’s expression shifted, the humor fading. She reached over and rested her hand on mine.

“But I wasn’t,” I whispered. “With him... I wasn’t scared.”

Her thumb brushed over my knuckles. “Mystic cares about you.”

I smiled, the kind that felt like it lived in my chest and not just on my lips. “Yes. He does.”

I looked up at the trees, then down at the shimmer on the water, trying to find the words in between the noise in my head. “He touched me like I wasn’t broken. Like I was... sacred. And for the first time, Lucy, I... I wanted to feel it. I let myself feel everything.”

She blinked, her eyes softening as they filled with tears she wouldn’t let fall.

I laughed, just a little, shaking my head. “The first time was not... fast, or wild. It was slow. Like he was memorizing me. Every imperfection. Every breath.” I sighed, gazing into the treeline. “The second time was faster, rougher, his need for me raw.”

“And you let him?”

“Yes, Iwantedit.” I looked at her then, really looked. “I didn’t just survive having sex with a man. Ilivedit. For the firsttime in years, I was not just a body being used. I was... a woman. Wanted. Held. Pleasured.”

She swallowed hard and pulled me into a side hug, her voice rough. “You deserve that. Every damn second of it.”

“I was afraid the past would follow me there... into his bed. Into that moment. But it didn’t. Not even a shadow.”

“He’s a good man,” she said.

I nodded. “Better than I thought any man could be. And now I’m scared... not of him, but of how much I already need him.”

Lucy leaned her head on my shoulder. “That’s love, babe. Or the start of it.”

I closed my eyes, the breeze tugging gently at my hair, and whispered, “Then I hope it lasts. Because I think he’s the only place I’ve ever felt completely human since I was sixteen.”