She didn’t let me finish. Instead, she just kissed me—a hard and passionate kiss filled with magic, but the magic of a woman, not a fairy. It was demanding and expectant, but yielding, too. And I admit it was a long moment before I finally pushed her away.

What can I say? I’m a guy and she’s a gorgeous woman. We have history. My body responded to her because of it, because it knew the familiar way we fit together. Because it felt right, just the way it always did.

But I did push her away.

“You can’t say you didn’t feel anything,” she said.

“That’s not the point.”

“I think it’s the whole point.”

She stepped toward me again, but I backed off a step.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “But it’s too late. Everything’s changed. I want to be with Jilly now.”

She folded her arms across her chest.

“And where is Jilly?” she asked.

“She’s . . .”

I didn’t even know how to begin to explain the world inside Jilly’s head.

I settled on, “She has some stuff she needs to deal with.”

“Without you.”

I wasn’t particularly happy about it myself, but that was neither here nor there.

“It happens,” I said.

I glanced away from her across the mesa top. Christiana was leaning against a pile of rocks that were covered with petroglyphs. Lizzie and Timony were farther away, the doonie studiously trying to pretend that he wasn’t watching us. I turned back to Galfreya.

“There’s not a whole lot else to say,” I told her. “Maybe we should rejoin the others.”

Her gaze met mine, and I saw the world of hurt sitting there in her eyes.

Why now? I couldn’t help but wonder. After all the time we’d been together and she’d never said anything, why had our relationship suddenly become so important to her?

She looked as though she was going to say something else, but then she simply nodded and we started back toward the others. Christiana immediately bounced up from where she’d been sitting.

“How did it go?” she asked.

“It didn’t,” Galfreya said.

And then she disappeared. Took that step from this world, away into another.

Christiana looked confused. “What’d I say?”

“Nothing,” I told her. “But if you were aiming for a career as a match-maker, you might want to consider some other options.”

“But you guys are so great together.”

“I guess we were. In our own way. But . . . everything’s changed.”

“She only did what she did to keep you safe,” Christiana said. “Because she loves you. Granted, she should have talked with you about it first, but come on, Geordie. Give her a chance. I know she’s sincere.”

“I want to be with Jilly,” I said.

“You . . .”

“And she wants to be with me.”

Christiana’s eyes went wide and then she grinned.