Page 16 of A Deal For a Kiss

Hope?

The mirror continues to blur, but the flame remains strong, burning brighter, almost as if it’s trying to keep my attention.

I let out a moan, and then I hear myself, as if from a great distance, moan again.

Chills flow over my skin. The world seems to shake and blur.

I have a flash of him, close to me, on top of me. Him taking me from behind, seated. The length of his body warm underneath mine. My body working against his in a steady rhythm.

It’s as vivid as a photograph. All of the times he’s kissed me. In a field with the wind in my hair, on the stone steps of a cottage, while I’m crying, young and naive, and lying in bed when he brushes my hair—hair that has turned gray—from my face. They all flicker before me and tears brim.

Memories flash through my head. I can feel his hands on every inch of my body, feel the way he’s touched me—not just once, but hundreds or thousands of times.

The murmurs of him loving me. And I say it back.

Tears fall and he brushes them away.

It cannot be real, I tell myself. But everything feels as if it’s happened over and over again.

The memories come in short flashes of him taking me, filling me, stretching me around him, heightening my pleasure and pushing me higher and higher and higher until I tumble off the peak.

I remember the pleasure nearly blinding me as he filled me again, on another day, on another night, tangled in another set of sheets and blankets. I see the light on his face from the sun and the moon and from the morning to the evening. I see him lying next to me on the bed, limp and sated, the sweat on his body slowly cooling as a warm breeze blows over us.

“I’ll love you forever, Ivy,” he tells me.

And I murmur his name. I promise to love him. I see our first kisses and our lasts.

There are so many flashes. I feel like I could drown in them. I want to run my fingers through them. I want to stay in one for longer than a heartbeat.

And then, suddenly, there’s no more wine and all that exists is him behind me in this very room and the tears that have settled just on my upper lip. The cup is empty, and it weighs heavily in my hands.

He leans down in front of me and blows out the candles. The darkness is abrupt, but I don’t have the energy to gasp.

I’m shaken from what I’ve just seen and felt and known to have been.

“Come with me,” he commands as he stands in the quiet room.

I don’t think I can stand, but he helps me to my feet and guides me back across the room. My knees feel weak as I fall into the mattress, grateful for how soft it is as it cradles me.

He pulls the blankets over me and looks into my eyes.

“You will find your place here,” he says. “You will.”

“What is your name?”

I try to remember. I justdidremember. I remembered so many things, but…

My eyes search his. I know I heard it. I know I did, but I…

“I can’t remember,” I tell him. Because none of those visions stayed. They felt so real, like they had to be remembered—those touches, those sounds, the feel of him—I had to be remembering the way he was with me, but they’re gone now, just like the candle flame.

He strokes my hair back from my face. I can still taste the wine.

“Did you remember? For a moment at least?”

“I saw so many memories but they’re all gone,” I say, knowing he’ll understand. “It’s like a blur.” I close my eyes and only a snippet comes back to me. My mind races and yet it’s exhausted all at once.

“They’ll come back.”

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