“You’re doing it again,” Luna observed from her perch on the kitchen windowsill.
“Doing what?”
“Looking at him like he’s the last scone at a tea shop.”
“I was not?—”
“The walls are pink, Cassie.Pink.”
She glanced at the walls. Traitorously, impossibly pink.
“I hate this house.”
“The house is just being honest. You should try it sometime.”
Before Cassie could respond with something suitably cutting, the sky outside darkened. Not gradually, like clouds rolling in. Suddenly. Like someone had thrown a blanket over the sun.
“That’s… not normal weather,” she said.
“That’s not weather at all,” Liam said from the doorway, making her jump. He was looking at her with an expression caught between concern and exasperation. “That’s you.”
“Me?”
“Your magic. You’ve been building up all week without proper grounding.” He crossed his arms, and the stupid too-small shirt stretched across his chest in ways that were deeply unhelpful. “Margaret warned you this would happen.”
As if to underscore his point, thunder rumbled. Inside the house. The lights flickered once, twice, then died completely.
“Well,” Jacques the toaster said in the darkness, “c’est la vie.”
They lit candles.
Not romantic candles—practical candles. Emergency candles that Cassie had bought during a hurricane warning three years ago and never used. They smelled vaguely of vanilla and regret and illuminated the kitchen in a warm golden glow that was absolutely not romantic, no matter what the walls suggested as they shifted to a deeper rose.
“The storm is yours,” Liam said, settling across from her at the kitchen table. The candlelight caught in his eyes, turned them to molten silver. “We need to ground it out before it gets worse.”
“How much worse can it get?”
Lightning cracked. The coffee maker exploded.
“Ah,” Cassie said. “That worse.”
“Margaret taught you the basics. Breathing. Visualization. Connection to earth.” He held out his hands across the table. “But you’re too charged. You need to discharge through something grounded.”
“And you’re grounded?”
“I’m the most practical bastard you’ve ever met.It’s like touching a lightning rod.” He wiggled his fingers impatiently. “Come on, lass. Unless you’d prefer to blow up more appliances.”
She took his hands.
The spark jumped between them immediately—not painful, butpresent. Warm. Like touching a live wire that somehow felt like home.
“Breathe with me,” he said. “In through the nose. Out through the mouth. Find the storm inside you.”
She closed her eyes and tried. The magic was there, crackling and wild, like electricity looking for somewhere to go. It had been building all week, she realized. Every time she looked at him and felt something. Every time the walls changed color. Every time her hormones staged a rebellion and her magic went along for the ride.
“That’s it,” he murmured. “Feel it. Don’t fight it. Just… let it flow.”
His thumbs traced circles on her wrists. Small movements. Barely there. Entirely devastating.
