He closed a hand around her wrist and squeezed. “Uh-uh. That’s a hard line for me, Mags. When something’s wrong, you either tell me what it is or tell me you don’t want to talk about it. You don’t lie. And you don’t try to hide it.”

“You’ve got a lot of rules for third dates,” she joked.

“I’m serious.”

“I…I actually don’t know what to say,” she said on a half laugh. “I don’t know how to tell people things.”

“Sure you do,” he said. “You tell your YouTube people stuff all the time.”

“That’s different. That’s not me being…”

“Vulnerable and real?” he supplied.

“Maybe that,” she admitted.

“It still counts as putting yourself out there. You aren’t showing them some kind of highlight reel in full makeup with studio lighting. You’re putting your hopes and dreams out there and asking strangers to care about them, too.”

“Geez. You’ve really been doing your research,” she said, impressed.

“When something interests me—or when I find out I’m missing out on something great like my asshole siblings and their dumb GIF conversations—I make an effort. Now it’s your turn. Talk, Nichols.”

Kevin, sensing her hesitation, leaned against her legs and looked up at her with unconditional love. She took a breath, and then the plunge.

“I was too selfish to notice Dean was gay, and I all but forced him to marry me, and then when he got up the guts to tell me the truth, just shy of our first anniversary, I put all of it on him. Blamed him for it all when the only thing he’d tried to do was not hurt me. We came back to each other—as friends—eventually, but I swore I would never do that to him or anyone again.

“Yet here we are a decade and change later, and I’m doing it all over again. I haven’t learned a goddamn thing. I’m still a broken twenty-two-year-old hanging on too tight to the pieces, hoping they magically fit back together.”

He didn’t ask her what broke her or if those shards ever cut her from holding them too tightly. He didn’t tell her to go easy on herself or agree or disagree. Instead, he very deliberately cupped her chin in his hands and kissed her softly, steadily.

His mouth was firm and warm against hers, and this time, instead of stealing her breath, it felt like he was giving it back to her. The tightness in her chest loosened, and something light and bright bloomed inside. Like heartburn. Only nice.

She tasted him, breathed him in, and felt both lighter and more firmly grounded.

“Gah,” she managed when she pulled back.

The smile that danced at the corners of his lips was soft and amused. He swiped his thumb over her lower lip.