Dove stiffens under my hand. She pulls away, putting a foot of cold, empty distance between us. The loss is instant and physical.
That’s the worst part.
“You should get that,” Dove says, her voice small. She doesn’t look at me. She wraps her arms around herself, covering the skin I was just staring at.
“Dove—”
“Go,” she whispers. “She’s waiting.”
Even if I wanted to say something back, I can’t, because my other sister, Marabella, comes to collect Dove. Marabella is twenty-seven, only three years older than Dove. Dove and Cordia are best friends but Marabella gets along with them too.
Marabella effectively taking Dove, I have no choice but to let her go. I can only watch her walk away from me, leaving me alone in the foyer about to open the door for the wrong woman.
Chapter Two
Dove
I’m standing in front of the buffet table, staring blindly at a platter of fruit tarts, but my nervous system is still back at the front door.
You look beautiful, Dove.
Shane’s voice is stuck on a loop in my head, deep and rough, like gravel over velvet. My skin still burns where his hand rested on the small of my back. It wasn’t a friendly touch. It was possessive. It was heavy. And for one terrifying, exhilarating second, I thought he was going to lean in and bite me.
“Breathe, Dove,” I whisper to myself, gripping the edge of the linen tablecloth.
“What was that?” Cordia asks, standing to my left.
“Nothing,” I mutter.
“She said ‘Free the slug’,” Marabella says. I can’t tell if she’s joking or is actually serious.
So I answer dryly with, “Yes. Easter reminds me of slugs. Great catch, Mara.”
Cordia leans into my face, staring into my eyes as if she can read my soul.
“Nah, she said ‘Shane eats bugs.’”
Marabella hums. “Shane eats bugs. Free the slugs.”
“I need hugs!” Cordia practically shouts, making both women giggle, and me along with them.
“You two have lost your minds,” I say with a chuckle.
“Maybe,” Marabella says, “But I haven’t lost my mind enough to have missed how I haven’t seen Theo in a good half an hour, which means the desserts are at risk. I’m going to check on him.” Theo being the youngest Archer at age nineteen.
“Shoot, I’ll go with you. I just remembered that I forgot to cut the strawberries for the fruit water. Want to come, Dove?”
“Not yet,” I tell my friends. What I don’t tell them is how I need to decompress. Instead, I finish with, “I’m just going to grab a snack.”
They nod and exit together, leaving me alone.
I need to get a grip.
It is the Archers’ Easter dinner and I am the sisters’ best friend. I am the safe, reliable, paint-stained teacher. I amnotthe woman Shane Archer wants to devour in the foyer.
He’s always been so hot and cold with me. Sometimes, I swear I see fire in his eyes. Cordia sees it, too. But then he never asks me out. The opposite, really. He asks other women out. Constantly. And during the few times I was brave enough to make a move, he rejected me. Subtly, but it was a rejection nonetheless.
Like on New Year’s Eve. He was briefly single for the first time in forever. I thought we had chemistry. A few weeks prior he punched a creep for me. Over me. It was romantic.
