"She can share with me," Wyatt said quietly. "We're friends, right? Friends can share."
My heart hammered as I nodded, trying to look casual. We went as far from the fire as possible without losing its warmth, and lay our bedrolls side by side, close but not touching. The stars above were brilliant, no light pollution for miles.
I shivered, pulling my jacket tighter.
"Cold?" Wyatt asked.
"A little."
He shifted closer, not quite touching but close enough that I could feel his warmth. "Better?"
“Yeah." Too much, actually.
We lay there, pretending to sleep while the fire died to embers. The camp quieted, snores rising from various bedrolls. A coyote howled in the distance, answered by another. I rolled onto my back with a sigh and tried to count the stars.
"Can't sleep?" he whispered.
"Too many stars," I whispered back. "Forgot how many there were out here."
"City lights wash them out?"
"City lights wash everything out."
He turned onto his side to face me, the fire burned down to embers behind him, throwing just enough light to turn his face into shadow and suggestion. Beyond us, the land stretched out in silver and blue, endless and quiet.
“I’m glad you’re here,” he said softly. His voice was low, roughened by smoke and wind and everything we’d survived. “Not just back in Copper Creek. Here. On this drive. Under these stars.”
Something in my chest fluttered. “Me too.”
He studied me for a moment, eyes tracing over my face like he was memorizing it all over again. “Even with everything? The mess, the complications, your father, the truth?”
I swallowed, the air cool against my skin. “Especially with all that. At least it’s real now. At least we’re not pretending.”
A small, quiet smile curved his lips. Then he reached out and brushed a strand of hair away from my face. His fingertips lingered at my temple, warm and rough, the touch feather-light but enough to make my breath catch.
“Ivygirl…”
The sound of it—soft, reverent—rolled through me like music I hadn’t heard in years. No one had called me that since before everything broke. Hearing it now felt like coming home and losing my balance all at once.
“We’re supposed to be friends,” I reminded him, but my voice came out unsteady, breathy, like even the wordfriendsknew it was a lie.
“Friends,” he agreed, though his thumb was tracing slow, careful circles along my cheekbone, and I was leaning toward him, helpless against gravity.
My knee brushed his under the blankets, and for a split second, he went perfectly still. He tried to hide it, but I felt the tension ripple through his body—tight, hot, unmistakably male.
A small, wicked thought flickered through me. I scooted closer, even though I knew I shouldn’t. “You’re warm,” I whispered. It wasn’t a lie. I was cold, but that wasn’t why I was inching closer with every breath.
His breath hitched. I didn’t have to look down to know exactly why. “Is this okay?”
“Yeah, just keeping a friend from freezing,” he murmured, but his voice had gone low, thick, and I could feel the heat of him throbbing through the inches of air between us.
“Right,” I whispered. But the space between us was disappearing, the air charged and soft and aching.
“Absolutely,” he said—right before his hand slid into my hair, his palm finding the back of my neck like it had every right to be there.
And then he kissed me.
Not desperate this time. Not furious or broken. Just slow and sweet and inevitable. The kind of kiss that spoke of memory and forgiveness, of all the words we’d never gotten right. The fire’s last light flickered across his face, and the night wrapped around us like a secret.
