“You’re shook up.”
“I’m gonna be fine in a minute.”
“I know. I’ll keep track. You have fifty-five seconds left.”
I smiled, then relaxed into him. We didn’t say anything. He didn’t move other than to rub those relaxing, grounding circles across my back. I breathed in deep and blocked everything else out.
Right now there was no murdering vampire, no tortured ghost dad, no bite tying me to a horror I was going to have nightmares about for probably the rest of my life.
Right now there was Ryder, my childhood friend, my secret crush, my current lover. A man strong enough, clever enough, and good enough, he’d found his way into my heart despite all the things that should make doing so impossible.
A man I didn’t want to risk with my crazy life, just like Jean didn’t want to risk Hogan. But Ryder had taken that choice out of my hands. If he hadn’t pushed, if he hadn’t insisted that he was worth the chance, if he hadn’t proved it, I never would have told him any of Ordinary’s secrets.
Maybe that’s what it took for one of us Reeds to really share our lives with the person we loved. That person had to be strong enough not to back down, smart enough to figure out all on their own that there was more to us, to our lives, to this town than it appeared.
So basically, we Reeds set nearly impossible goals for our partners.
So not fair.
Maybe Jean could change that. Maybe she would throw caution to the wind and tell Hogan because he deserved to be told, and she deserved to love him without secrets between them.
Maybe Myra, who hadn’t dated since her last boyfriend left the country years ago, would finally stop trying to be the most responsible person on the planet and the mother of all of us. Maybe she’d let down those thick walls around her heart and fall for someone.
I worried about her. She’d been too serious and had thrown herself into work since Dad’s death, going from dedicated to work-herself-to-death. I knew a lot of that was her way to grieve. We were all grieving, still, in our way.
But Myra seemed to be closing down, turning inward. She’d always been the quiet one but she was becoming even more quiet.
I should probably talk to her about it. Or give her a week vacation away from this place.
Which I knew she would never accept while we had a kidnapping, killer, and some kind of ghost problem on our hands.
“Five, four, three, two, one.” Ryder squeezed me, his hand pressing flat against my back, his other hand, which had been still on my hip, rubbed up and down a little. “Time’s up, beautiful.”
Aw…that was sweet.
“You think I’m beautiful?” I couldn’t help fishing for another compliment. This was still new between us and I liked hearing how he saw me.
I leaned back and unwound my arms, wrapping them around him.
He smiled down at me, the light from the setting sun casting his features in deep golds. “I have always thought you were beautiful.”
“You told me I was dorky-looking in sixth grade.”
“Yeah, I was stupid in sixth grade. Didn’t want my friends to know how much I liked you.”
“You liked me?”
“It was those ponytails you wore.” His hand brushed my hair back from my face, tucking it behind my ear before he cupped my face. “They were always sort of crooked, and you were like, ‘whatever, who cares? I like it like this.’”
“I obsessed over my ponytails. I could never get them straight.”
“I was obsessed over wanting to straighten them for you.”
“Latent OCD?”
“No. I just wanted to touch you, and it would have been a great excuse if I’d been brave enough to do it.”
“Instead you went with the dorky comment? Lame, Bailey.”
