Two lifelines. Better than none.
She closed the laptop before the tears could start. But she wasn’t gone yet.
Her grandmother had faced down the Shadow Council twice in her lifetime: once during the territory disputes of the sixties, once when they’d tried to tax independent practitioners into oblivion. Both times, she’d won. Not by being the most powerful witch in the room, but by being the most stubborn.
Hazel came from a long line of stubborn women.
She scrubbed at her eyes and straightened her shoulders. She’d figure this out. She always did.
A soft knock at her bedroom door. “Hazel? You okay in there?”
Marcus. Of course he’d noticed she’d been hiding.
“Fine,” she called, voice only slightly wavering. “Just… checking email.”
Silence. Then: “I’m making coffee. Come out when you’re ready.”
She took a shaky breath, splashed water on her face, and opened the door. Time to pretend everything was fine. Time to not think about how her entire life was falling apart.
Hazel was brushingher teeth when she heard the controlled breathing and soft thud of flesh hitting the floor from the kitchen. Marcus was doing pushups, and from the sound of it, shirtless.
She rinsed and spat, then crept to the doorway. Muscle moved under skin as he lowered himself down, pushed back up. Sweat traced a line down his spine. The morning light turned his skin to bronze, picked out the shadows of muscles she hadn’t known existed. Two days since their first kiss, and she still couldn’t look at him without remembering the taste of his mouth.
His rhythm faltered. He’d noticed her watching.
“I didn’t know you were…” she started.
“I’ll put a shirt on.”
“Don’t bother on my account.”
The words slipped out before she could stop them. Marcus went perfectly still, arms locked, staring at the floor. She could feel the tension that had been building for days.
“Hazel.” Her name came out rough.
She fled to the shower.
By afternoon,the tension had wound so tight she could barely breathe. They sat in the living room, supposedly reviewing her testimony for the hundredth time, but she couldn’t concentrate on anything except the way his fingers moved across the pages.
Marcus had retreated into his most professional mode: clipped sentences, formal posture, eyes fixed on documents heprobably had memorized. She’d seen her grandmother do the same thing: burrow into work, pretend the feelings didn’t exist, hope they’d pass.
“You’re too stiff,” she said, though she was the one sitting rigid as a board.
“You’re too casual.” He frowned. “This is serious.”
“I know it’s serious. It’s my life, Marcus. My business. My testimony.”
“Then act like it matters.”
“It matters more to me than anyone.” She slammed the papers down on the coffee table. “You get to walk away after this. I have to live with whatever happens.”
“Do you? Because you keep—” He gestured vaguely at her.
“I keep what?”
“Being you.”
She bristled. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
