Butterflies fluttered in my stomach as I slid from beneath the covers and padded to the window. When I parted my sheer blush-colored curtains, Trace was standing outside on the lawn, hands stuffed into his pockets, waiting. He wasn’t smiling. He wasn’t fidgeting. He wasn’t frowning. He was simply watching.
Our house had the old style windows that push out, so I unlatched the right side and pushed it out toward Trace. He’d apparently taken several steps back after he’d knocked, so it didn’t come anywhere near him.
“What are you doing here?” I asked quietly, hyper aware of what Brady’s reaction would be if he found Trace at my window. Luckily, Julia was still gone, although I doubt she would’ve cared anyway. She wasn’t exactly maternal.
I leaned against the window sill, waiting for Trace to speak, but he didn’t. He just stood perfectly still for about thirty nerve-racking seconds.
Finally, the light breeze carried his raspy voice to my ears.
“There was something I wanted to tell you.”
“Okay.”
He took one step forward. “I couldn’t stop thinking about you tonight.” Another step. “In fact, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you for a while.” Another step. “It’s just getting worse. But tonight,” he said, taking the step that would bring him within a foot of me. “There was something else.”
I felt breathless with anticipation. I saw his honey eyes, turned dark gold in the dim light, flicker to my lips and back.
“And what’s that?”
“Something I’ve wanted to do for a while, but tonight I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep until I do it.”
“What’s that?” I repeated, my own voice barely a whisper.
“I want to kiss you, Peyton,” he confessed, shifting forward just enough to put his face within six inches of mine. “I need to kiss you.”
Slowly, as if giving me plenty of time to tell him to go home, plenty of time to stop him before he went any further, he raised his arms and cupped my face in both of his hands.
“I need to kiss you,” he said once more, almost reverentially. And then, inch by agonizing inch, he lowered his head until his lips met mine.
As though someone had flipped a switch to turn it off, the world disappeared the instant his mouth made contact with mine. At that moment, it seemed that all I would ever need to live would be provided through the touch of his skin. I didn’t have to open my eyes to know that there were threads from our souls stretching from the center of our being and meeting in the air around us. I could feel them joining us together, bonding us forever.
Trace tilted his head and deepened the kiss. My lips fell open and his tongue slipped easily between them. It slid along mine, teasing me with the sweet taste of his mouth as he moved one hand to the back of my head.
I reached up to hold on to his biceps, needing more contact, but unable to get it with the wall between us. They twitched beneath my fingertips causing a thrill to race down my spine.
Much too soon, Trace wrapped up the kiss and pulled his mouth away from mine. He looked down into my face and smiled, a gesture so gorgeous I thought my heart might stop.
Happier than I could ever remember feeling, I smiled in return. But then a sad, troubled look fell over his face like a dark curtain. And I felt doom knocking at my door.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“I also came to say goodbye,” he announced, rocking my world to its very foundations.
“Wh-what?”
“I’m going to find my father.”
“But what about the magic and trying to figure out what’s going on with your mother?”
“I still want to do that, but I just got this feeling in my gut like I should go back to the meadow. I think my father might be there.”
“Trace, that’s crazy! What if he’s not the only one there? What if there is a repeat of last night?”
“That’s a chance I’m willing to take. This is just something I have to do,” he said, taking a step back away from me. “I just wanted to see you before I left, just in case…”
“Don’t talk like that!” I felt almost panicked at the thought of never seeing Trace again. “This is…it’s…it’s crazy!”
“I know, and if this wasn’t something I truly felt that I had to do, I wouldn’t go. I’d wait until I had some more answers. But I just feel like I need to go tonight.”
I let his words sink in as I debated my best course of action. It seemed, however, that logic and reason and sensibility were all taking a back seat to the overwhelming fear that Trace was walking out of my life forever, that something might happen to him and I’d never see him again. I knew that I literally couldn’t survive without him. I knew that if he didn’t come back that I would be torn apart by all that was happening around me. Instinctively, I knew that he had been made specifically for me, and I for him, that we were necessary for the other’s survival.
So I decided to go with him.
It wasn’t as rash a decision as it sounded. The realization hit me that I would rather die with him than live without him. That’s what made up my mind.
“I’m coming with you,” I announced flatly, hoping my tone brooked no argument.
“No, it’s too dangerous.”
“I don’t care. Two is better than one. We’re stronger together. You know that.”
He opened his mouth and started to say something, but he snapped it shut quickly. I knew what he was doing. He wanted to argue, he was trying to argue, but he knew it as futile. He knew I was right. He knew there was no point in debating the truth of the matter.
“Out there, I’m not sure I can protect you.”
“Then maybe I can protect you.”
Several emotions flickered across his face in rapid succession. It was a fascinating display to behold. And then, with an urgency born of something not from this world, he stepped forward, drove his fingers into my hair and crushed his mouth against mine.
Desperation was there. Desire was there. Strength was there. Gratitude was there. So was fear, just a small amount, but it was all wrapped up in something else, something stronger than every other emotion. It was something solid and eternal, something mystical and surreal, something more important than anything else in our lives.
When he released me, both of us breathless and shaking, I tossed him a quick smile and ducked back into my room to throw on jeans and a long-sleeved t-shirt. Pushing my feet into tennis shoes, I raced back to the window.
Only he was gone. He’d left me anyway.
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