Pine.
Not some artificial air-freshener scent, either. Real pine, like a forest after rain, or earth, sweat, stubbornness, and something unfairly comforting.
And yeah, maybe I’m staring too. Sue me.
His deep brown gaze slides to me, and my stupid heartskips a beat like I’ve been caught with one hand in the cookie jar and the other down my pants.
I glance away so fast my neck almost snaps, my eyes going back to Alaina, who’s lounging next to Dane and smirking at me.
Did she just catch me checking out Mason?
Fuck.
It’s both infuriating and wildly arousing, and I don’t know whether I want to shake her or kiss her senseless.
My brain flashes back to last night, to the way my gut twisted when Mason didn’t come out of her room after saying that he “needed to talk to her first.” He was in there long enough for my paranoia to grow claws and start scratching at the inside of my skull.
So, I checked on them. I opened the door, expecting,hell, I don’t even know what, but I found them lying on her bed, side by side like two halves of the saddest yin-yang I’ve ever seen, each with a hand under their cheek like they’d been whispering secrets and fell asleep mid-confession.
No touching or cuddling, and no clothes on the floor.
Regardless, my heart did this awful, searing thing as it lit itself on fire, and then laughed at me while it burned to ash. Not with jealousy, not really, or notjustjealousy but withlonging. I wanted to bebetweenthem. I wanted to slither in the middle and pull them both close, bury my face in her neck, press my back to his chest, and fucking drown in their warmth.
Instead, I stood there like a moron while the two people I want most in the world dreamed without me.
“So that’s why we’re here. Because of Raine,” Dane says, drawing me back to the room as he finishes his explanation.
Almost everyone is here. Otis and Piper were given the chance to back out before they made themself complicit inwhateverthisis.Maman,Mason’s dad, Mason, Dane, all of them here for Alaina.
Except Greer.
I’ve texted him twice but only got the lovely blue bubbles of silence in return. He’s probably still pissed, or avoiding Dane, or both. Either way, I’m trying to do the adult thing, give him space, let the air clear, and let the storm settle before I inevitably show up to bully him back into some fucking sense.
Becauselike hellwill I let him leave things like this. Not with Alaina, not with Dane. Not withus.
Even with how distracted I’ve been by Mason, my head still spins with all that Dane said. Now that everything is out in the open—the disguise, the plan, thewhy—fuck, it all makes so muchsense. Her fury, her silence, the pain she carried like a backpack full of bricks, and the way she threw herself into racing like she had nothing left to lose.
Because she didn’t.
And it only makes her hotter. I tear my gaze from where it has wandered to Mason again and rake it over Alaina.
Yep.
So muchhotter.
She’s a fighter, a survivor, a goddamn phoenix with scraped knees and a wicked mouth.
She’s smiling to herself, like the sun is a little closer, and the weight is a little lighter.Mamantold me the hour with her therapist went well, and maybe that’s why the tangle of grief and rage in her chest isn’t choking her quite as tightly today. I know what it took to earn that smile, and she’s even more beautiful when she lets herself be soft.
Or maybe it’s just because Mason finally pulled his head out of his ass and stopped being a complete dickhead.
Whatever it is, I want to protect it at all costs.
I barely finish my thought when Otis pipes up from the couch.
“Wait, are we sure it was him?” he asks, frowning. “I mean, I hate the guy, too, don’t get me wrong. Isaac once joked I must be fast because Igrew up running from stuff.Isla thought it was hilarious and repeated it in three interviews. Guess who got labeled the‘wild card with a troubled past’before I ever qualified?”
“Fuckers,” Alaina mutters, and I agree wholeheartedly.
