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A waiter with a beard perfect enough to receive its own corporate sponsorship took our order.
“One of them is here?” I said, resisting the temptation to study every staff member.
“Waitress with the tattoos. To your right.”
I stole a glance at her as she walked to the kitchen. Another annoyance: she was absolutely beautiful.
“Remember to smile,” he said, taking my hand across the table.
“I’m waiting for my Bloody Mary to arrive.”
With the waitress still in the kitchen, I leaned in. “I read through the journal. Am I really supposed to just follow the instructions and expect magic to happen?”
“Yes, but if you convince yourself it’s not going to work, then it won’t.”
I rubbed my temples. I wanted to cry. I wanted to sleep. I wanted to be back in the truck bed under the stars, curled against him. I wanted to strangle Aurora with a hairdryer cord.
“And where do I do this? In my apartment?”
“No,” he said immediately. “There’s a place.”
I looked at him. I didn’t like the hesitation. And then I didn’t need him to finish, because I’d read the entry twice by lamplight, in a hand pressed deep enough to tear the paper. Seven days they kept me in the house they built.
“The house,” I said. “The one where they held her. It’s still standing?”
“The big Queen Anne on Lessard Street, the dead end past the old cannery road. Boarded up since before we were born.” He watched me take that in. “You’d know it if you saw it. It’s the one everyone’s afraid of without knowing why.”
“Because it’s the place where she won?”
He nodded. “It’s probably the only place she’ll come.”
A chill moved through me that had nothing to do with the overzealous HVAC.
“Well if I get murdered—”
“I’ll come inside with you; make sure everything looks okay. I’ll wait outside. I’m not leaving you there alone.”
Our food arrived. I struggled through a bite of artisanal avocado toast.
Damian looked about as hungry as I was. He absently broke into a piece of sourdough, his eyes reluctant to leave me, like he was searching for reassurance that I wasn’t quietly breaking in half. His focused attention made it impossible to think about anything but him. We were an island in a room.
The waitress clocked us as she walked past. A defiant part of me wanted to glower at her. But I was trying my best to be brave, not stupid.
We left our table with our food in to-go boxes. I had a feeling mine would be fed to the trash.
The large doors swung open right as we were about to walk through them. Two faces I knew.
I slowed without meaning to.
Damian subtly squeezed my hand.
Callie and Kai were walking right toward us. Callie saw me a half-second before I could rearrange my face. I saw the edge of panic across hers, then a smile that was fast and wide.
“Oh my god, hi!”
“Hi,” I said. “What are the odds?”
Kai had his hand at the small of her back. He was taller than I’d remembered, relaxed in a way that now looked perfectly trained, and he gave Damian a look that was friendly on the surface, but I saw the calculation underneath it. Damian returned that look precisely. Two men who knew exactly what the other one was, pretending they were oblivious.
