“Your secret’s safe with me,” I assured her, snickering into my wine. “Gooey. Wow, that sounds foul.”

“Oh, it was most foul,” Talia said, her smile widening. “Then Addie started a rumor that it was actually some kind of rare and highly contagious skin STD. So she got hers in the end, the clever kid.”

“So I was right to think of you as chaotic neutral, back in high school,” I said, taking a sip of wine. “And I get that sense from Issa and your mother, too. Very ‘I am woman, hear me scare the living fucking daylights out of you.’ ”

“I do make it my life’s work to be a nasty woman.” She chuckled again, her pewter irises reflecting the fire’s flicker. “Though Issa and Addie, and honestly even Micah, are way more like our mother than I am. At least in some respects.”

“How do you figure that?”

“Well, you can’t accuse Elena of being anything but freewheeling, in pretty much every way you can think of. We all have different dads, you know. She’s never let anyone stick around for long enough to threaten becoming a real partner, much less a co-parent. More power to her, for the whole self-partnered thing. But I can’t say I understand it.”

“So that’s not what you want?” I said carefully, unsure what it was I even wanted to hear. It wasn’t like I had any intention of staying here beyond the month, of starting something serious with anyone who made their home in Thistle Grove. The crackle of attraction, the spark blooming between us . . . that was just temporary and unexpected fun, a delightful reprieve from all the bullshit and baggage that came with being back here. And Talia must know that, too, given how upfront I’d been about my feelings on this town.

So why did it matter to me now, to know what she might be looking for?

“No,” Talia said, angling her head to catch my eyes. My breath snagged at the directness of her tone, the conviction in it. The utter lack of ambivalence. “Not anymore. Being that self-sufficient . . . that’s how you drive away the people that matter. The people that you want to stay.”

“Is that what happened before Gareth?” I asked softly. When her face shuttered like a portcullis slamming closed, I backtracked in such a hurry I nearly tripped over myself. “I’m sorry, I—I didn’t mean to overstep. You said at the Cauldron that you got your heart broken, I just wondered if . . .”

“It’s okay, Harlow. It was a fair question.” She rubbed her lips together, scraping wine stain from them with her teeth. “But I don’t want to talk about Jess tonight. I’m not saying never, just, not tonight. Not when we’re supposed to be celebrating.”

“No, I get it, really,” I assured her, relieved I hadn’t irretrievably spoiled the mood. “Speaking of celebrations, what’s the deal with having one in these creeper woods? I assume it hasn’t escaped you that they’re kind of a raging horror show.”