If anything proved that to me, it was last night. She seemed truly sorry for what had happened.
So here I am taking up for her, taking up for the one woman who’s not supposed to have an effect on me. She’s not supposed to get under my skin, but everything about her is clinging to me anyway. The way she smells, the way she moves. Watching her is like looking at an angel come to earth.
That proves it—I’ve lost my mind.
“The magic’s getting to you,” my friend whispers.
I inhale sharply. He’s right. It’s impossible to separate the magic from what’s real. Whatisreal?
Her showing up in my shower taking a good look at my cock wasvery real.
Which reminds me. I need to speak with Ophelia. Whether I pulled Addison into the shower with my desire, or whether it had more to do with distance, it doesn’t matter. It can’t happen again.
“The magic’snothaving an effect on me,” I tell him lamely.
He snorts. “Of course it is. The ceremony gets ruined, and you’re taking up for the one person who caused it, and everyone knows that. It obviously wasn’t your magic that made the tree burn to the ground.” He sighs. “Feylin, I say this as your oldest friend—don’t forget what you want. Don’tforget what was taken from you, and how you’ve dreamed of this opportunity.”
My chest constricts. He’s right. I’ve bided my time for too long to simply believe in coincidence. Addison is a stepping stone.
What we have is forced by magic.
But that’s hard to remember when she’s smiling at me, or when she pushed that curl off my forehead. Her every touch makes my skin sizzle. It ignites me from inside.
I exhale a gusty sigh.
It’s not real.It’s not real.This will end. It has to. It’s supposed to.
No one—especially not her parents, would allow anything to come of us anyway.
“Have you contacted the council?” Trawick asks.
“I thought you were going to do that,” I complain.
“I was bluffing. Giving you a chance to see if you’d do it. Well?”
He’s eyeing me with suspicion. I wave my hand. “Clearly I’ve been preoccupied.”
He snorts. “I’ll do it for you, then. You need to get this moving if you want the bookshop shut downbeforeyou end the relationship.” He gives me a hard look. “Ifyou’re going to end it.”
What he doesn’t say, and what he doesn’t have to, is—like you said that you would.
“You made a promise to yourself. Think of Tess.”
My words growl out. “I am thinking of Tess.”
My chest tightens so hard it feels like a hand’s squeezing every drop of life from my heart. What I’m doing, I’m doing because it’s supposed to be done. Because ithasto be done.
The last time I loved and lost, it nearly killed me. I’m not going through that again.
I’m not.
This, whatever this is between me and Addison, it’s only magic. There’s nothing else to it.
And I’ll do well to remember that.
I rise. “I hate to cut our meeting short.”
Trawick rises. “You have to go. And as a reminder, the water ceremony’s soon.”
