Page 46 of Hexes and Exes

Fifteen feet from coffee shops and Knit Happens, the town’s yarn store. That’s all I can think of. Instead of some flashing blur of my life and everything that I’ve fucked up over time running through my head, it’s this oddly slow moment in time where I feel so helpless. There’s nothing under my feet that I can step off of. My fingers fail again and again to grab hold of something to pull myself free. My clothes are so heavy. All I can do is marvel at the absolute absurdity that I’m going to slip beneath this icy river, which will refreeze, and nobody will find me until it thaws in the spring. Even then, who knows when my body will pop back up.

I can’t even cry because my body is shutting down from the cold. All I feel are regrets. I should’ve lived more, been bigger, louder. Bram’s face flashes before my eyes. I’m so sad that all we did was share a kiss.

My body is too rigid to keep struggling. I can’t move my legs.

“Fucking Crone,” Bram’s voice angrily shouts, pulling my attention up the bank. He’s sprinting and sliding down the steps so fast I’m afraid he’s going to join me in the water. I open my mouth to yell at him to be careful, but I can’t get any words out.

“Fucking hell, Ava.” Bram braces his feet against a rock and hooks his hands under my armpits, his shadows snapping out to help with the lift. He yanks me out of the water, and we fall backward. I land on top of Bram, unable to move.

“Shit. We need to get up. I need to get you warm.”

I want to help him, but I can’t move. I know something is very wrong because I’m not cold anymore. In fact, I don’t feel anything but sleepy.

“Ava, don’t you dare.” Bram cups my cheeks and shakes me. Oddly, I feel the heat from his palm. There’s a spark of magic that jumps from him to me. “You keep those eyes open.”

I don’t know how he does it, but he manages to stand cradling me in his arms like a bride. I’d make a joke, but I literally cannot open my mouth.

“If you’re trying to scare me into remembering you forever, mission accomplished. What the hell were you thinking?” Bram mutters the entire time he climbs the slippery stairs. I can’t even tell him to watch his step.

When we get to the top of the steps, Bram looks around, swinging me like I’m not weighed down by a pile of icy, saturated clothing.

“My place is closer,” he says as though answering a question he didn’t voice out loud. With my body clutched tight to his, he practically runs over to his car. The car beeps as he opens the door and sets me in the passenger seat. He disappears from view, but a few seconds later he has a blanket in hand. He must’ve gone to the trunk.

“Shit, I don’t know if I should take your coat off or just wrap you up. Fuck. Coat off, I think.” Bram's fingers are shaking as he unzips my sodden coat. I can’t even help him get my arm out. He moves my body around like a rag doll and yanks one sleeve free and then the next before wrapping the blanket around me.

He runs around the side of the car so fast, he slides the last few feet. Then he’s in the car and cranking the heater up full blast. The only problem is that it’s freezing outside so the air that pumps out is cold as hell.

Bram reaches in the back of the car and produces a stocking cap. He shoves it over my head.

“Your skin is blue.” Distress creases his forehead as he reaches for the seat belt and buckles me in. He drives like a madman back to his house, and we make it there in record time. Bram is out of the car and running around to the passenger side before it has fully warmed up. Despite his urgency, he’s gentle when he lifts me out of the seat and carries me inside.

“Can you stand?”

I want to tell him yes, but all that comes out is a chattering of my teeth.

“Shit.” Bram leads me to a chair and sets me down. He drops to his knees and immediately begins taking my shoes and socks off. He looks up at me, his brows drawn and his gray eyes worried. His aura is a dirty yellow and his fear stabs me in the heart.

“I have to get your clothes off.”

“Perv.” Somehow, I manage to get that word out.

Bram closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. A spike of relief washes through me. “I promise I won’t look.”

“Insulting.” Oh look. I got out another word.

Bram huffs out a laugh. “Alright, chuckles, let’s get you undressed.”

When I imagined Bram peeling my clothes off for the first time, it was not in any way related to the scene playing out in front of me. He grabs my pants by the ankles, but they’re clinging tight. Shaking his head, he reaches for my waist instead. If I wasn’t a human popsicle, I’d be worried about the way my stomach folds, and how thick my thighs are, but I’m too coldto give it more than a second’s thought. Bram lifts my hips and peels my pants off with an efficiency I would be impressed by, if my cooch wasn’t right in his face.

“Kill me.” My teeth are chattering loudly now, so the words are barely discernible.

“I’m trying to prevent that, actually.” Bram grabs a blanket off the edge of the couch and drops it over my lap. “Better?”

I nod. Bram unwraps the blanket from my shoulders and pulls my sweater over my head. “Can you get your bra?” Bram’s throat bobs as he swallows. His eyes are very clearly locked on my chest.

I close my eyes and try to lift my arms, but I’m still too fucking cold

“No,” I groan.

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