I watch him as he turns and heads for the bathroom, my gaze never leaving that broad expanse of back. Okay. I lied. I’m really watching his ass. You would, too, if you could see it like I can.

I close my eyes and drift momentarily, not thinking about much at all. I can’t remember the last time that actually happened. There’s always something with me (it’s sort of my curse), so to have this quiet, this lull between the storms is something that I cherish. Even more so because it feels like it’s been given as a gift from him to me.

There’s warmth on my chest now, and I crack open my eyes. He’s smiling down at me as he wipes my chest with a cloth. “You got some on your eyebrow,” he says, sounding amused.

“I was very pent up,” I explain as he dabs my face.

“That what you call it?”

“Well, I might also be a shooter.”

“Good to know. Anything else?”

“We sound weird.”

He drops the cloth off the side of the bed and crawls up beside me. “What do you mean?”

“Like we’re giddy.”

He pulls me into him with a grunt. “You sound oddly pained in addition to weirdly giddy.”

I roll my eyes. “And you sound disgustingly smug.”

He laughs. “A little smug,” he admits.

“Because you took my flower?”

He groans and shoves me away. “Moment over.”

I roll over on top of him and straddle his waist with my hands on his chest. My ass bumps his groin. “That hurts,” I mutter.

“I’m sorry,” he says, but the grin on his face makes him a liar.

“A lot smug,” I tell him as I slap his chest.

He captures my hand. The smile slides off his face. “Ty?”

“Yeah?”

“What now?”

Ugh. Reality. I sigh. “I don’t know.”

“This isn’t a one-off for me.”

“I know.”

“This isn’t something you can walk away from.”

“I know.”

“Then?”

“Needy,” I mutter, but I allow myself to be pulled down. I bury my face in his neck as he traces my back with his fingers.

We lie like this. I don’t know for how long. Each of us are lost in our own thoughts. For him, that was never a problem. For me, though…. Well, you know how it is. I think, of course, of all the reasons why this should never be. I think of all the reasons why this won’t work. I’m leaving Seafare at the end of summer. I’m a mess and can’t be cured by an overblown confrontation with my mother or a magical dick, even if it belongs to someone like him. I’m not a kid anymore. Not even really the Kid, even if people still call me that. It’s a shadow from the past.

So I tell him the only thing I can. The truth.

“We’re good together. You and I.”

“I know,” he says. “We always have been.” And we always could be goes unsaid.