Total pages in book: 21
Estimated words: 19879 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 99(@200wpm)___ 80(@250wpm)___ 66(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 19879 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 99(@200wpm)___ 80(@250wpm)___ 66(@300wpm)
“Nothing but moonlight and candles.” He comments as we walk closer to the blanket.
“Very pretty I think,” I comment and steal a glance at his sharp jaw line peppered with stubble. Oh how I wish to run my fingers down his jaw and kiss him.
“Yeah,” he says, blowing out a breath, and I’m quick to avert my gaze so he can’t read the thoughts. I’d meant to be lighthearted, but Finley seems relieved that I mentioned this fact about the moon so casually. “How long have you been practicing?”
“Do you mean…how long have I been researching?”
“No.” I see his smile out of the corner of my eye. “I meant practicing.” He pauses, looking right at me and seeing through the fake pretending. “It’s been about 11 years for me.”
Witchcraft. He wants to know how long I’ve been practicing witchcraft, because he’s been doing the same thing. My bottom lip drops in surprise just slightly. I can’t believe I never sensed that about him. I can’t believe I never thought to bring it up. There were a million chances to drop it into conversation. I’ve spent hours and hours here hovering around the same shelves, looking at the same kinds of historical documents, gathering facts about the same coven.
And Finley knew that. He’s known about the books I checked out. He handed me one of those books just yesterday.
Of course he would know.
Out of everyone in town, he probably knows the most about what I might be able to find, and I was crushing too hard to ask him about it directly.
Is this it? I think to the universe or fate or whoever is guiding the spell I cast last night. Is this the moment of clarity? Because it feels like it might be.
“Since college, at least seriously,” I answer, because he’s just waiting patiently, like we have all night. He’s in charge of opening and closing the library—I guess we do have as long as we want. “So, seven years? Eight?”
“That’s a good number.”
A smaller shiver goes down my spine. “I hadn’t thought about this being my seventh year.”
I bite my lip to keep from saying something totally inappropriate about how I mostly feel hot, overwhelming attraction right now so thinking or doing any kind of math is hard. Finley’s hand is still on my lower back as if he’s forgotten that he’s touching me or he wants to touch me so badly that he can’t bring himself to stop.
“This is beautiful tonight,” I say finally, the words sounding high and breathless. “I love the indoor picnic by candlelight.”
“The picnic comes later.”
“Oh? So we’re…using the blanket first?” The words slip past my lips before I can stop them.
His eyes flicker with amusement once again and then he says, “The surprise will be better if we’re sitting down.”
Oh, God. Are we going to make out on the blanket? Did he bring a blanket and cushions and candles into this little back room so we could make out? That would be… amazing.
If the intention I put out into the world has opened his mind to the possibility that I might be into him as much as he’s into me. Light goosebumps start at my wrists and go up to my shoulders.
I can feel it again—that tension between us. If it had a sound, it would buzz like the lights in the library usually do. There’s no buzz to distract us right now, though, and the small room is so quiet that I can almost hear my own heart beating.
“After you.” Finley holds out the hand that’s not on my back, and I nod to him, smiling reflexively, my face hot. It’s an easy path to the blanket, and when I lower myself down, I discover it’s more than one blanket, folded to make it more comfortable.
He sits down across from me, and I can’t help remembering how close we were in the aisle before. He’s closer now, his knees almost touching mine. The scent of his cologne filling my lungs.
My fingers itch to touch him again so badly. I ring them around each other instead.
That, I think, would be the real proof. Touching skin to skin and not over clothes. That would tell me what I desperately need to know about this mysterious, quiet man who knows about witches and covens and history and might even have cast his own spell.
That makes my breath stutter for a second or two.
Our intentions have to be aligned, don’t they? Otherwise my tires would’ve gone flat or someone would’ve rear-ended me on the way here or the power outage would have been a disaster and not a bump in the road.
And Finley wouldn’t have waited so long. He’d have come to the conclusion I ghosted him and gone home for the night.
But he didn’t, and nothing stopped me, and now I’m here. Now we’re here.