“But I have to admit, I’ve been wrong about your sister-in-law.Ex-sister-in-law, whatever.”
Layla smiled, thinking of Em at dinner last night. A tearful reunion. A happy one. Shedidstill think of Emily as a sister; that was the nice thing to come out of all of this.
Separate from anyone else in the MacKenzie family, she still felt that way about Em.
“Oh?” Layla said. “What brought this on?”
Cara’s steps slowed, more like a stroll now. She shruggedcasually, was quiet for a few seconds, clearly distracted by something on her phone. She slowed to a stop, and Layla figured it was work.
Then she tucked her phone away, looked up at Layla, and said, “I think she really cares about you. Just for you. Whether you’re sisters or not, you know?” She was smiling widely, excitedly. “I really think that.”
“Okay?” Layla said, but also—she felt it. A warmth moving inside her.
Not from Cara’s smile. Not from the nice things she said about Em. Not from the sunny day or the not-cigarette smell of the Esplanade or the breeze off the water.
A crackle in the air, like lightning.
A fae prince, a column of smoke, a shade from heaven.
Come to get his mortal girl.
She turned, and there was Griffin.
* * *
Cara left with only a brief explanation: a text she’d gotten late last night from Emily, the two still in each other’s contacts from way back when there were still pre-wedding events for Layla being scheduled; some hasty planning to make sure Layla would be here when someone else—someonespecial—would be waiting. After that, a quick blown kiss, an assessing gaze at Griffin in his all-black, his baseball cap. A declaration that she had not, in fact, enjoyed astroll, and actually she did have a destination to get to,thankyouverymuch, and Layla wouldneed to call extremely soon,okay?
Then, Cara left them alone together.
Or as alone together as you could be in a city of people, which—as Layla and Griffin both knew—was actually quite a lot.
“Hi,” she said, half disbelieving. Him,here. She had never seen him here.
She had never seen him anywhere but in the air, and then in Paris.
She found herself profoundly, overwhelmingly relieved to know that he had the exact same effect on her in this place. She knew for certain now—in a way she couldn’t possibly have known three and a half months ago—that he would have this effect on her anywhere.
After any amount of time.
“Sorry it took me so long,” he said, which, as an opener, was not particularly profound.
But he had his ball cap low, his hands in his pockets. Nervous, and maybe also feeling some pain. Travel, a new place, a walk from wherever. It could be pain.
“It wasn’t that long,” she said.
He blew out a breath. “It felt long to me.”
She smiled. Part of her wanted to say,Oh my god, for me, too; it’s felt like forever; part of her wanted to close the distance between themnow, to throw her arms around him and squeeze and squeeze until she could assure herself that he wasn’t a hallucination, that the magic heaven of him wouldn’t simply disappear into the air.
But another part of her felt aNot yetfrom him. That’s what she was reading in his ball cap, his hands tucked away.
So she stayed quiet. When her smile started to feel unwieldy, she lifted her coffee to her mouth, and watched as he tracked the movement: her lips around the lid, her careful sip on an indrawn breath, her throat moving in a swallow.
He said, “Back to American habits already.”
A teasing note. She heard it.
She shrugged. Still smiling, probably. “Maybe itdidtake you too long.”
