Page 50 of Unspoken Promises

“What makes you feel so unsafe? I mean, I know the nature of GhostEye makes you a target…”

“I don’t really think of myself. I worry about my family.”

Our steps crunch against the pathway.

“Do you worry a lot?”

It feels a step too personal to admit I do. I’ve been able to nearly wipe out my panic attacks, but survivor’s guilt? I’ll carry that all the way from my cousin’s bleeding body right to the grave. If anything like that ever happened again I would pray to God to take me.

But that’s what I like about Ava. She doesn’t press when she knows it’s futile. She knows about timing and finds a way to make a person feel comfortable sharing their story… or not. Often by finding a way to mirror what she knows, even though you didn’t say it.

“I worry,” she admits. “I get so anxious with it sometimes, and I think to myself, why the hell worry?”

“You want control. Anxiety is thinking about the future. And we can never be proven wrong about tomorrow. Which means we’re always right.”

She pauses to think about what I’ve just said. “But we’re trying to control the outcome of things, right? And make things better for ourselves by thinking about it over and over? That’s what we’re doing.”

We.

I step up onto her porch, and she follows.

The towel falls off her shoulder, and her skin glows in the golden porch lamp. “But anxiety can’t protect us. It has the exact opposite effect really.”

Some of her hair is sticking to her lip. I brush my thumb along the corner of her mouth to peel it away and stopmyself from stroking my knuckles over her freckled jawline. She’s beautiful in this light.

“How did you get all that wisdom when you’re still so young?”

“Same way as you, I’m guessing.” Her features have shifted. There’s something soulful in her gaze I’ve never seen before. “I’ve been through things.”

My gut is heavy, soaking in the pure warmth of this connection. “Hardship prepares ordinary people for extraordinary things. Right?”

Her puffy pink lips are perfect when they curve into a sweet but sassy smile. “Always listening.”

I blow a puff of air out of my nose and lower my gaze. I’m going to set on fire if I keep staring at her like this.

We’re in front of her door now; it’s a moment in time I recognize. It’s that moment when it’s time to say goodbye but you don’t want to.

But I’m not going in with her. And I’m not taking her with me. Inside, I say it through gritted teeth but I say the words anyway—I’m being fucking professional.

“Well, if you’re not needing anything else…”

Suddenly, she throws her arms around my neck and hugs me hard. Like she’s been holding in her gratitude this entire time and it’s built up. “Thank you, Enzo. Really… that was… scary.”

She doesn’t let go. I don’t want her to. Her breath on my neck tumbles warmly across my earlobe. The triangle of her bikini is still wet, and it blots my chest through the unbuttoned opening in my shirt, a warm, moist breast pressing on my skin. Even late in the day, and after being soaked, that musky scent of hers hits me with emotion.

Her lips feather my collarbone, and her words almosthum on my skin. “It feels like you’re always saving me these days.”

I don’t know where to put my hands, but it’s a genuine, gracious hug and one I can’t refuse. And I don’t want to. It’s normal I rest my hands on her lower back, so I do, and the curve of it is like a preface to a story I very much want to read.

My mouth goes dry. She can probably feel the thump of my heartbeat.

She’s on her tiptoes and still hanging on, and I recognize this moment, too. It’s one that precedes a kiss…

The heat of her mouth on my neck is almost too much to bear when she utters, “I told you I was sheltered.”

She leans back, and thank God, too, because it’s taking all my strength to act like her boss and not some man hungry for much more.

Her bright sepia eyes glow in the porch lamplight.

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