Would that seem weird? Or maybe it’s better to sit still and act as if I’m not overthinking everything about this moment?
Ace finishes before I do and wipes his hands on his napkin. I take my time, trying to match his ease as I chew my last bite and clean my hands too.
When I put down the napkin, he reaches out, hooking his pinky around mine, and a waft of his burned wood with dark patchouli scent waves over. The scent and gesture make me freeze for a beat, my eyes dropping to where our fingers are linked.
“How’d you sleep?”
“Good.” I look up at him. “Too long. I think I’ve had such a lack of sleep these last few years that now it feels like I’m trying to catch up.”
“Don’t spill bullshit,” he teases. “You’ve always been a long-nights, long-sleeper kind of person.”
I chuckle, looking away to hide all the emotions that bubbled up. His memory of me feels like both a warm embrace and a stab of something sharp. “Maybe.” He doesn’t push further, only nodding, then turns his gaze toward the driveway. “How about you? How’d you sleep?”
“Good,” he answers simply.
“What are we doing out here?”
Ace finally turns to look at me again. “I was talking with Levi and Koen while you werecatching up on sleep,” he says, giving me a pointed side-eye that makes me laugh.
“And?”
“And,” he continues. “We decided to go with the plan outside the Lane Building. On the street.”
“You did?”
“It’ll mean some adjustments to the plan, but Levi’s idea makes sense. More people, more visibility, and a bigger impact. It’s… ambitious.”
Ambitious is an understatement. It’s reckless and bold andutterly Lane.“And you’re okay with that?”
“I am,” he says, hooking his pinky tighter with mine as if trying to ground me in his certainty. “What do you think? You okay with the change?”
“I guess I’ll have to be.” It’s not like I knew the first plan very well.
Hell, I still don’t know the current one, if I’m honest.
Ace’s smile is small but knowing. “Then let’s get to work.”
“So why exactly are we here?”
“The new plan needs you and me to get on skates and deliver a few hundred decks of cards to people in the crowd.” His voice is so casual that he may as well have said we’re grabbing bubble tea.
I glance at the skates sitting next to him, and my stomach drops.
Fuck.I’ll fall on my ass.
But then it clicks, and I snap my eyes to him. “You?Outside the house? In a crowd?”
Ace smirks faintly, but there’s a nervous edge to it like he’s waiting for me to call him out. “It’s necessary.”
I’m still wrapping my head around the idea when he shifts forward, pulling the skates closer to me. “Please don’t move.”
“What are you…”
Before I can finish the question, he kneels in front of me, his hands reaching for my sneakers. My heart stops for a beat, and I watch as his fingers work at the laces, loosening them before sliding my sneakers off.
The intimacy of it, the quiet, unspoken care in the way he handles my feet, makes my breath hitch. I want to stroke my hand through his hair, but I force myself to stay still.
He slides the skates onto my feet, his fingers brushing against my ankles as he fastens the straps. “That okay?”
