She hesitated, then stuck out a hand. “Colette. Colette Baxter. Everyone calls me Cole.”
Her hand was small, warm, and trembling just enough that I pretended not to notice.
“Silas,” I said. “Silas Reed.”
Her brows lifted slightly. “Like the?—”
I saw theexactmoment it clicked. The recognition. The flicker ofoh no.“The author,” she finished carefully.
I nodded once. “Used to be.”
That seemed to stump her for a moment, and the silence that followed wasn’t uncomfortable so much as… aware. Like we were both trying to make sense of how this day had gone so wrong.
I frowned, reaching for the landline. “I’ll call the owner. They must have double-booked.” Picked it up. Dead silence. I tried again. Nothing.
“Of course,” she muttered. “Why would it work? Why would anything in my lifeeverwork again?”
Ignoring the question, I kicked off my snow-covered boots, setting my duffle and my large suitcase beside me.
“How were the roads?” She asked, arms tight around her waist.
“Precarious at best. And my taxi has since departed, Colette.” I fiddled with the buttons on my flannel, unsure of where to put my hands or what to do next.
“Cole,” she corrected with a furrowed brow, “and you’re insane if you thinkI’mdriving in this. I made sure to come up before the snow started.”
She glanced toward the window — the snow was coming down in heavy, relentless sheets now. “Well, Mr. Author, I don’t think either of us is going anywhere.”
CHAPTER 3
Colette
He saidmy name like it meant something. Mywholename.
Like he wasn’t just repeating it, but tasting it.
A little shiver ran down my spine. Nobody had done that in a long time.
Hell —nobodyeven called me Colette. Not even my parents.
I busied myself with wiping the counter that didn’t need wiping, pretending not to feel how hot my skin went under the collar of my sweatshirt.
“So, Silas Reed,” I said — half to fill the silence, half to confirm it wasn’t just some bizarre coincidence. “You really arethatSilas Reed? The one with the tortured men and tragic endings?”
He gave a quiet hum, half amusement, half weariness. “Unfortunately.”
“Well,” I said, tossing the rag in the sink, “that explains the brooding.”
His mouth twitched — not quite a smile, but close. “You’ve read my work.”
“Regrettably,” I said too fast, too sharp. His eyes lifted to mine, steady and unreadable, and something in my chest tripped over itself. “I mean — yes. Years ago. Book club. A phase.”
“Tragic endings were a phase?”
“No,” I muttered. “Men who made me cry in public as a teenager were.”
The wind howled outside, rattling the windowpanes like a warning. The lights flickered, then held steady again, and for a second neither of us moved. “A teenager?” The knot in his throat bobbed. “I only published my last… successful book a decade ago.”
It wasn’tquitea grin that crossed my face, but it wasn’t… not a grin. “Yeah, you did.” I busied myself with the tangled decorations in my hands. “And I read it on the bus during my senior year of high school.”
