And Mateo is still looking at me like I’m the only person in the room.
“Oh,” I whisper.
His mouth quirks. Just barely. “Yeah. Oh.”
The memory of his mouth on mine invades my soul, and I’m tempted to grab his hand, drag him to his truck, and make him take me home so we can finish what we barely started last night.
“Sit,” Macy says, gesturing to the empty chairs. “You two look like you’re about to fall over.”
Mateo pulls out the chair next to me and drops into it. Dean takes the one beside him. Up close, they look worse. Dust in Mateo’s hair. Dirt smudged on Dean’s forearms. Both of them look exhausted.
Mateo’s arm comes around my shoulders. Automatic. Natural. Like he’s been doing it for years.
Maybe he has. Not the arm, specifically, but the care behind it. The coffee, the bookends, the showing up every time I needed him. That’s been there for years. I just wasn’t letting myself see it. I just wasn’t paying attention.
Or maybe I was paying attention to all the wrong things. Missing what was right in front of me this whole time.
InWildfire Summer, Diego shows up every time Ivy needs him. He makes her coffee the way she likes it without asking. He defends her without hesitation. He’s been quietly, steadily loving her for years while she convinced herself they were just friends.
I wrote that two years ago, sitting in my apartment, missing something. Someone.
Oh.
My chest tightens, warm and full. It feels like coming home. I lean into him without thinking. His thumb brushes my shoulder.
“How bad is it?” I ask because I need to focus on something other than the fact that Mateo has been calling me his treasure for five years, and I thought it was an old Halloween joke.
Embarrassing.
Dean and Mateo exchange a look.
“It’s not good,” Dean says.
“The windows need to be custom-ordered,” Mateo adds. “The adobe wall needs professional restoration. The door frame is cracked. Someone tried to kick it in.”
“Okay, not great but… nope, not great.”
“It gets worse,” Dean admits.
My stomach drops.
“Worse how?” Jess asks.
“They spray-painted the inside walls. Knocked over and broke nearly all of the shelves. A lot of the books are damaged—spraypainted, pages torn, covers ripped.” Dean’s voice is careful. Gentle. “Many of them can’t be salvaged.”
The air leaves my lungs.
My books.
Not justmybook. All the books. The ones I sold to customers. The ones I recommended. The ones I shelved with care.
“How many?” My voice sounds far away.
“Hard to say for sure,” Mateo says quietly. “But a lot,tesoro.”
The nickname hits different now. Softer. More meaningful.
“Insurance will cover it,” Dean adds quickly. “The inventory. The repairs. All of it.”
