I mean. Charmaine’s not wrong about the fried brain part. There’s a reason I can’t sit still longer than six seconds at a time, and it’s not ADHD. But I wasn’t using when we had a conversation I’ve regretted ever since. Hadn’t been for years. I?—
Warm hands touch my face. The same work-hardened palms that slid along my jaw ten minutes ago.
Galen.
He’s stopped walking—we’vestopped walking. And merde, we’re outside my house, which means we’ve passed his two-bed end-of-terrace on Cinnamon Row, the one he pointed out from the top of the hill, and crossed into the shithole street whereIlive.
How?
How?
Did we teleport here?
There’s no other explanation. At least not one I can think of right now, while his gaze is so arresting I forget the world around us exists.
My racing thoughts, though.
They’re a different beast. A resilient one, and they don’t still. Not even for hot firefighters who look at me as if I’m worth something.
We’re outside my house.
Myemptyhouse.
That means we’re going in, or he’s going home, and I’m not ready for either of those things.
I can’t fuck him.
Kissing him has damn near killed me. But I can’t find the words to say goodbye to him either, and a fraught sensation seizes my chest, tension flooding my limbs.
Fuck.
Or not.
Shit.
I search for salvation in Galen’s green eyes.
He does that thing with his thumbs on my cheekbones again. “Take a breath.”
“I’m breathing.”
A grin different tothatsmile lights his face. One that’s more comfort than joy. “You’re vibrating. And it’s page one of the advanced firefighter’s training manual: how to spot the panicking Frenchman.”
“I’m not that French.”
“You’re whatever you want to be.”
He’s not talking about my Parisian father, and we both know it. As much as we both know the slow breath I force on myself is hard-won.
“I like walking,” Galen says when I don’t speak. When I just cling to his wrists and stare at him. “And I like kissing in the rain. If you ever want to do this again, you know where to find me.”
I’m too lost in his gaze to comprehend what he’s saying. To do anything but fucking swoon as he gives me another lighter-than-air kiss.
My heart jumps.
My skin shivers.
And it’s such a brand new feeling it blinds me to the reality of Galen easing back again, like he did up on Figgy Mount. To him stepping away, until it’s too late and we’re not together anymore.
