Page 11 of Until Then

He flicks a lock of my red hair. “Reminds me of a flame, and your eyes sort of blaze when you talk. You’re a wildfire that burned through me yesterday.”

What a line.

No really, it was a stupidly good line.

I clench my fists at my sides while he enters his number, battling with my own frantic mind over if I should trust him, or if I’ll stumble face first all over again when I’m left unwanted and never enough.

Noah hands me back my phone and walks me to the door.

I freeze when he kisses me slowly, tenderly, like he’s worshiping my mouth. For a moment, I even let myself fall into it.

A beautiful goodbye.

“Well, thanks,” I say with an awkward shift back and forth on my feet. “Talk to you later.”

Noah’s hands catch the top of his front door and he leans forward, the bulge of his biceps heating the blood low in my belly. He smiles and says, “Until then, Wildfire.”

Outside, around the corner, out of sight from Noah’s condo, I stare at the new contact in my phone through blurry tears.

He put his name as Wildfire’s.

I got a nickname and he let me claim him all in five minutes. Like he belongs to me.

I don’t know if I’m making the biggest mistake of my life, but I swear I hear the snap of my heart falling apart when I delete the name from my phone.

FIVE

Noah

NINE MONTHS LATER

I’m fully aware the guy four tables over is watching me.

With a sly sort of maneuver, I shoulder him out the best I can. The last thing I want is for tonight to turn into a front-page tabloid.

I already feel like an idiot for thinking this would be different this time around, and Sir Paparazzi over there doesn’t need to capture the moment.

Sweat starts to pool under my palms, and my insides churn like someone took a corkscrew to my gut.

The screen of my phone lights up with a photo. For a moment the dread stills and a smile cuts across my mouth.

I flick open my brother’s message, and stare at my obsession—the freaking cutest nephew.

The Jude monster must’ve borrowed the drumsticks from Tate Hawkins—the drummer in Rees’s band—and was pounding Rees’s messy, heavily dyed blue and black hair. His four-year-old head is thrown back with his silent little laugh, and my sister-in-law, Vienna, is holding his hand, face red from laughing.

Under the image she wrote:

Tate and Rees told him to play a song to send to his Uncle Noah. Apparently, Dad means drums.

I snort a laugh and respond.

Me: It’s because Reesie Cup has a hollow head and it echoes.

Me: Also, I’m officially going to kidnap him when y’all come for the wedding. Prepare yourself, Vi.

Vienna: Try it and see what happens.

Me: You’re scary.

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