Page 42 of The Witch is Back

That kiss.

But. Always a but.

“Bastian?”

He shook his thoughts away. “Give us time, Mom.”

“Fine.” She smiled, a smile that sagged at the edges, tiredness painting itself with lavish strokes. “You know now, Bastian, her truth,” she reminded him. “And you’re not the same young man that left.”

No, he wasn’t. Whether that was a good or bad thing, he was harder, slower to trust and more guarded. So was she. He hoped she hadn’t had anything to do with the contract, but he couldn’t be sure. Not when her guilt had brushed up against him. How could he trust without knowing what she felt guilty about?

A decision slid into place. The hex may choke him, prevent him from talking about the contract clause or the conversation he’d overheard, but this was a truth he could know. A question she could answer. And maybe they could move past it. Past everything.

Emma hadn’t expected him to be there when she returned but as she opened the door, Bastian stood up from the couch. Panic fluttered in her throat and the edges of a portal manifested, her will to flee so strong.

She wasn’t a coward, she reminded herself. Just...

She wasn’t sure what she was.

She closed the door behind her and Chester, her familiar gamboling over to Bastian to throw himself at his feet, belly side up. The TV was on and provided a murmuring backdrop of voices.

“Hello.” The word was neutral. Not angry, not questioning.

Bastian bent to give Chester a quick stroke, but his eyes remained on her. When he spoke, his voice matched hers. “Hello.”

They faced each other as if squaring off to combat. The idea sent a flood of exhaustion into her bones and she almost swayed. “I don’t want to argue, Bastian.”

“Me neither.”

Her fingers found her opposite sleeve and began to pick at it. She hated this. She hated that the air rippled with the echo of her voice pouring out old hurts, that it thickened with the reminder of his memory read that had given him a front-row seat to her humiliation.

They stood in silence that yawned like jaws.

Too many thoughts crossed his face before, finally, he cleared his throat. “I’m sorry.”

The old Emmaline might have been knocked off her feet into a swoon.

Emma relinquished her sleeve and folded her arms. “For what?”

“For leaving you without explaining why.” His expression turned pained. “For leaving you to deal with the fallout and not realizing there’d be one. For leaving you for so many years. For leaving you...” He stopped. Closed his eyes. “For leaving you alone. I’m sorry. Emma.”

She stiffened the walls around her heart. She wouldn’t break that easy.

“Pretty words,” she said.

“I mean them.”

“Words come easy to you, Bastian.” They always had.

His jaw ticked.

She gripped her sides where she could reach, searching for courage for what she had to ask. “So, tell me now. Why you left. The real reason.”

Something dark flickered in his eyes, his face. It made everything inside her tense in instinctive reaction.

Chester’s claws on the wooden floor and a shampoo commercial on the TV should’ve provided a break in tension, but neither of them even glanced away.

Finally, he gritted out, “All I can tell you is that I was young and stupid.”

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