“Our children potentially being erased from existence doesn’t inconvenience him?”
“Apparently, not as much as disappointing a bunch of randy historical hookers.”
Logan shakes his head, then gives me that look that means he’s about to say something I’m not going to like. “We need to talk about Gage.”
And there it is.
Ice forms in my veins. “Why?”
“For starters, we can’t tell him about any of this. The light driving, the children, Candace’s plan—none of it. There’s too much for him to digest—mostly about his own reality. But we do need him on board.”
“Logan—”
“No, please listen.” He picks up my hands, his fingers warm against mine despite the chill in the air. “Think about what happened tonight. Gage saw you kiss Marshall and completely lost it. If we tell him about the light driving, the fact we’re trapped, about Candace’s plan to erase our children, his children... he’ll do something catastrophically stupid trying to fix it.” Logan pauses long enough to glare at Ellis’ house. “And Gage doesn’t know about his real father yet. He doesn’t know he’s Demetri’s son, doesn’t understand what that means for his future. If we pile Candace’s schemes and existential threats on top of that revelation…” He blows out a breath. “Skyla, the two of you need to have your moment, have your children. It’s the natural order of things. And if Gage starts to brood about the two of us trotting off to have our happily ever after, the one you deserve with Gage may never happen. We’re not erasing Nathan, Barron, or Sage on my watch. And I know we’re not doing that on yours either.”
I open my mouth to argue, but the words die in my throat because the rational part of my brain knows he’s right. Gage is already barely speaking to me. Nothing says,take me back,like my mom wants to murder our unborn children across multiple timelines. Although with Gage’s hero complex, that might actually work in my favor. Nothing gets him fired up quite like having someone to save, especially when that someone is me, or comes from me. “So what do we do?”
“We try to right the wrongs,” Logan says, his voice carrying that determined edge that lets me know he’s made up his mind. “We don’t count on Demetri to help us with anything. His only interest is helping himself. We work on fixing the relationships that are supposed to happen, nudge things back toward the way they should be.”
“And how exactly do we do that without revealing why we know how things are supposed to be?”
Logan’s smile looks more like a grimace. “Very carefully. I’ll work on getting Brielle and Drake to notice each other. You work on Gage.”
“Work on Gage, how? He’s not exactly receptive to my charm at the moment.”
“Figure it out. You’re the one who marries him one day. There has to be something about you that he finds irresistible.” He winks as he says it. “Let him know he has your heart.” He closes his eyes for a moment. “If we’re going to get the future back on track, we don’t have a minute to waste.”
“Oh, Logan.” I groan. “Here we are again. You pushing me toward Gage while everything burns down around us. It’s like the universe’s worst recurring nightmare.” A heavy sigh escapes me. “This is supposed to be our time. And here we are, torn apart onceagain. It doesn’t seem fair. And the thought of charming my way back into Gage’s good graces feels both wrong and impossible.”
“It’s not wrong. It’s right.” Logan cups my face in his hands, and his thumb traces my cheek. “Just be yourself. The real you, not the version who’s trying to juggle multiple timelines and save the world. The you that Gage fell in love with in the first place.”
My chest tightens. “What if that’s not enough?”
“Then we’ll figure out something else. But right now, this is our best shot at preserving the future we know. There is no one on Earth or in Heaven who will erase our family.”
A group of drunk sophomores stumbles past us, their laughter echoing off the fog-dampened air as they argue about something that probably seemed hilarious five beers ago. The contrast between their carefree attitude and our celestial train wreck makes my head spin.
I take a shaky breath. “Okay. We’ll try to fix things. But if this goes sideways?—”
“It won’t.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I know you,” Logan says quietly, his eyes never leaving mine. “And I know that if anyone can convince Gage to stop being an idiot and realize what’s right in front of him, it’s the girl he will never stop loving.”
We walk back toward the party together, the fog swirling around our feet as if it’s trying to trip us. The music gets louder, the laughter more raucous, and the scent of spilled beer and teenage life-altering mistakes grows stronger with each step.
Logan pauses at the edge of the crowd. “Ready?”
I square my shoulders and prepare to dive back into the chaos of Ellis’ party with a mission that could determine the fate of our entire future. “Ready and willing to manipulate destiny.”
“That’s my girl.”
“I get it from my mother.”
A quick smile lives and dies on his lips before he sneaks a kiss to my cheek.
We step into the thicket of bodies, and Logan immediately veers off toward where Brielle sits sulking by the pool house, looking as if her world just ended.
