I hear the door open. Locke’s voice, low and even—I can’t make out the words. A pause. Then her voice, and the sound of it hits me somewhere I wasn’t ready for.
Soft. A little rough. Guarded but not weak.
I close my eyes for half a second just to get my shit together.
Footsteps. The door closing.
The air in the house changes.
She’s inside. She’shere. I can feel her like a physical thing—not just sound, not just presence, but something that slots into place in my chest like it’s been waiting for exactly this space.
Rane exhales. “Okay. Okay. We can do this. We can be normal.”
“Can we?” Vaelor’s voice is strained.
“We have to. She’s going to walk in here any second and see a group of guys who look like they’ve been hit by a truck. We need to pull it together.”
He’s right.
I turn away from the window. Force myself to breathe. Try to make my face look like something that won’t terrify her.
The others scatter—trying to look like they weren’t just plastered against a window. No one’s pulling it off.
Footsteps in the hallway. Getting closer.
And then she’s there.
Standing in the doorway. Silver-blonde hair and pale eyes and a face that’s trying so hard to give nothing away.
Our eyes meet.
Everythingstops.
My lungs forget how to work. My hands are shaking and I don’t know when that started. The room narrows down to just her, just those pale eyes looking back at me, and everything I thought I knew about myself rewrites around a single thought.
There you are.
I’d know you anywhere. I’d know you in the dark, in a crowd, in a hundred years. I don’t know how I know that but I do, Ido, and she’s standing right there and I can’t—
She looks away first. Her cheeks go pink.
Oh.That blush. I want to know everything that makes her do that.
I take a step toward her without meaning to.
Rane’s hand lands on my shoulder. Warm, solid, keeping me where I am.
“Easy,” he murmurs, so low she can’t hear.
Thank gods someone is stopping me from doing something stupid.
She’s looking around the room now, taking in the space, the furniture, the four other men who are all trying very hard to look like they weren’t just plastered against a window watching her walk up.
Her eyes come back to me.
Just for a second.
My chest does something stupid.
