Page 40

Eden

D ropping to his knees, he kisses me, his hand finding the slick mess he’s made of my chest. “God,” he says.

“I don’t suppose you have a warm washcloth with you,” I say dryly.

He leans his forehead against mine and says, “No.”

“I didn’t think so.”

“I do have a towel; hang on.”

He gets it from the car and cleans me up, then tosses the towel aside and wraps his arms around me. I hug him back, and we cling to each other, rocking, for a moment. As intense as everything we’ve done physically has been, in a lot of ways, this is more intimate, and my eyes prickle with tears.

“Hey,” he says, drawing back. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” I say. “I’m, um, really okay.”

That makes him laugh. “Yeah. Me, too.”

He tucks himself back into his briefs, zips and buckles his pants, then guides me back down to the blanket, pulling the other one over us.

We lie there for a bit, hand in hand, spinning through the universe.

And that’s intimate, too. Funny that you can have someone’s cock down your throat but the wrap of their fingers around yours feels even more personal.

I squeeze his hand, and he squeezes back.

After a few minutes, he tells me about his conversation with Tucker earlier.

“That’s a little?—”

“Mysterious, right?” he says. “There’s more to that story. But no way I was going to pry it out of him. He’ll talk when he’s ready.”

“Tucker hasn’t had his letter from the will yet, right?”

“Nope.”

“What do you think it’ll be?”

“Something like what the rest of us had to do. Some job that’s all wrong for Tucker. He’ll probably have to guard a super-spoiled princess who’s in line for the throne of Monaco or whatever.”

I giggle. “And he has to protect her from evil forces.”

“Evil fae warlords?”

He laughs. “Different will.”

“I wouldn’t put it past your grandfather.”

“Me freaking neither.”

After a while, he says, “I’m getting cold. You?”

“Freezing.”

“You should have said.”

“I didn’t want to go.”

He helps me to my feet, rubbing my arms to warm me up. “You want to come back to my place? We could, I don’t know, watch a movie or binge bad TV. I could make hot chocolate. I have marshmallows left over from the s’mores. We could cut them up and make mini marshmallows.”

“That sounds amazing.”

We gather the blankets and get back into the car.

At his place, he hands me one of his sweatshirts and makes us both mugs of cocoa, and we settle onto his couch, sipping.

“When will you go back to New York?”

The words fall with more weight than I mean them to. I guess once you’ve traded bodily fluids, it’s tough to keep things casual.

“I have to make a quick trip Tuesday to deal with some loose ends. Then I have two more weddings to get through. Friday and Saturday.” He frowns, like something in what he’s said bothers him.

“You okay?”

“Yeah—just…” But he doesn’t finish.

“Do you think—” I hesitate, not sure whether to bring it up. But I know it’s what he’s thinking about. “Do you think Weggers will cut you slack?”

He cocks his head. “I don’t know. I don’t fully understand what motivates him.

I think it might be one of those rare cases of what you see is what you get .

My grandfather gave him a job, and he’s determined to do it.

In which case, the outcome depends on what he thinks my grandfather would want him to do.

If I haven’t gotten an answer from him by tomorrow, I’ll check in with him.

I don’t know what’s taking him so long. Maybe he’s holding a seance. ”

I snicker but then sober. “And if he doesn’t grant you an exception?”

“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it, but I’m not going down without a fight.” He shakes his head. “We can deal with that tomorrow.” He holds up the remote. “What’s your favorite TV show?”

I think about it a second. “I mean, probably Outlander .”

“Would I like it?”

I grin at that. “No idea. It’s all over the place. Time travel, romance, swashbuckling adventure.”

“You mean, basically our road trip?”

“Maybe a little more violent.”

Rhys’s eyebrow goes up. “Like they actually come to blows over the music selection in their covered wagon?”

I snort.

He puts it on, and we watch, curled up together on the couch.

“How long is the show?” he asks after the pilot. “Like, how many seasons?”

“Eight. We won’t get all the way through it before you have to leave.”

We’re both quiet. I can hear the hum of the guesthouse’s electric heat and the purr of the minifridge under the kitchen counter. I think I might be able to hear his heartbeat, too.

“We might not,” he agrees finally, and I’m grateful he isn’t trying to paper over that reality and also that he isn’t offering solutions that will never work, like dating long distance. “But we could watch another one now.”

It’s not until he offers that consolation prize that I realize how much I want him to offer more. The whole season, the whole show, all the shows we could stream, me sitting next to him on the couch, head against his chest, feeling his heart beat against my cheek.

But I don’t ask for it. He’s not for me, and I’m tired of grasping for what isn’t mine only to lose it in the end.