Total pages in book: 31
Estimated words: 32231 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 161(@200wpm)___ 129(@250wpm)___ 107(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 32231 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 161(@200wpm)___ 129(@250wpm)___ 107(@300wpm)
“Don’t look at me like that,” he rasps.
“Like what,” I whisper.
“Like you’d forgive me for wanting you.” He steps back before I can reply, opens the door, and leaves me with a room full of heat and no instructions.
The town keeps calling us cute. That afternoon, Winter drags me to the general store and “accidentally” buys a bridal magazine at the register. A group of teenagers see me in the canned goods aisle and whisper, that’s her, like I’m a folklore creature. A little boy points at me from his mom’s cart and says, “Fire lady!” and I nearly cry into the baked beans.
I make it home on halfway-stable legs. I try to throw myself into something that isn’t Clay: I pull out the tote of unbroken bisque I salvaged, run my fingertips over the chalky rims, and tell myself they’re not ghosts. I sketch glaze ideas. I drink tea. I don’t text him. I absolutely do not text him.
When twilight spills over the ridge and paints the living room blue, I light two candles and let their small stubborn flames make the night less empty.
The door knocks once. Not knock-knock-knock, it’s Winter or the way Bella drums like a woodpecker. One solid knock that says man who doesn’t ask for what he needs. My heart sprints into the hallway before I can stop it.
I don’t open the door. Not right away. I make myself breathe, smooth my hair, wipe glaze pencil off my thumb, remind my lips not to do anything stupid.
When I let him in, the night climbs in with him. He brought the mountain on his jacket—woodsmoke, cold, a wild edge like he wrestled a weather system for sport. He’s changed into a black hoodie that makes his eyes darker and his mouth worse.
“Panel’s fine,” I blurt, then wince. “That’s not why you’re here. Obviously. Sorry.”
He shuts the door with his boot and looks at me like he’s already halfway to lost. “Tell me to go,” he says.
“No,” I say, and I don’t even pretend to think first.
The breath he takes is rough enough to scrape sound. He steps closer like he doesn’t remember deciding to, hands half-fisted at his sides like it’s killing him not to touch me. It’s killing me that he isn’t.
“I keep trying to do this right,” he says. The words are a rasp. “Stay on the line. Keep it clean. But you—” His mouth twitches like it can’t find a smile and would hate it if it did. “You’re gasoline.”
I swallow. “That sounds dangerous.”
“It is.”
“You should probably go,” I whisper.
“I should,” he agrees, not moving.
“Clay.”
“Ember.”
We hover there on the edge of something violent and kind. I feel its shape. I want it anyway.
“Come on,” I hear myself say, because I’m a menace to restraint. I grab two sweatshirts and a blanket and shove them at his chest. “Walk with me.”
“Where?”
“The ridge.” I nudge his hoodie with my chin when he doesn’t take the clothes. “You said I’m gasoline. Let’s go somewhere that can handle the fire.”
He huffs out a laugh he tries to smother. He doesn’t succeed. “You’re going to be the death of me.”
“Unlikely,” I say, tugging on the sweatshirt I keep by the door for bad ideas. “You’re too stubborn.”
He takes the blanket. “Fine,” he mutters. “Fifteen minutes.”
We end up staying out for an hour.
The sky over Copper Mountain is clear enough tonight to make a person believe in foolish things. The town looks small from the ridge—porch lights glimmering and stars shining overhead. We sit on the flat rock, shoulder to shoulder, blanket over our knees.
We don’t talk at first. We listen. The cold does that—it strips language down to whatever will keep you honest.
“You were good today,” he says eventually. “Wilton looked for a loose wire and you didn’t give him one.”
I pick at the fringe on the blanket. “You were… better.”
“Better how?”
“The hand.” I nudge his thigh with mine. “That thumb trick. You patent that?”
His mouth softens. “Someone taught me once.”
“Teach me,” I say before my dignity can tackle me. “I could use a portable Clay.”
“I’m not portable.”
“You’re right. Industrial grade.” I turn my head to look at him. Even in moonlight, he’s carved. “You’re getting good at this.”
“At what?”
I let the word hang, then say, deliberately: “Wanting me.”
His breath leaves like I hit him. He turns his face away, jaw tight and beautiful, then back again. “That’s not pretending,” he says, the exact same cadence as before, and it lands inside me like a match on tinder.
I lean. He doesn’t. We’re both so careful and so stupid.
“Okay,” I whisper. “Then what do we do with it?”
“We wait,” he says, voice wrecked and rude. “We do the job. We get you paid. We end it clean.”
The words feel like cold water. I hate that I understand. “And if clean hurts.”