Page 85 of Summertime Hexy
“True.”
I nudge him with my elbow. “I meant it used to make me antsy. Like I was missing something, or about to. But this?” I look around, letting the firelight flicker across the carved runeson nearby stones, the faint trail of soft lights leading back to camp. “This is good quiet.”
Derek hums. “The kind that settles in your bones.”
“Exactly.”
I shift closer, resting my head against his shoulder. He doesn’t move. Just lets me settle like he was waiting for it. I watch the flames for a long time, and then I whisper, “Do you ever think about what your life would’ve been if you hadn’t ended up here?”
“Every damn day,” he says, voice low and honest.
I look up.
He’s staring into the trees. His eyes aren’t glowing. They’re soft. Human.
“I’d still be wandering,” he says. “Still hiding from who I used to be. From what I lost.”
His fingers brush mine, slow. “But here? With you, and Milo, and the Grove—this is the first place that feels like it’s mine.”
I swallow the lump forming in my throat. “Yeah. Same.”
He glances at me. “Really?”
“I’ve never stayed anywhere this long before,” I admit. “Not without blowing something up or getting thrown out or… running.”
He doesn’t say anything.
Just pulls me into his side, tucking my head under his chin.
“I thought I was broken,” I say quietly. “Too much. Too wild. Tooloud.”
“You’re not too much,” he murmurs into my hair. “You’reexactlyenough.”
The words land like magic.
Like truth wrapped in warmth.
We lie there for a while, letting the fire burn low and the woods hum around us. Then I speak again, voice soft.
“What does camp mean to you?”
He exhales slowly.
“It means second chances.”
I nod. “Yeah.”
He turns toward me, lifting my hand to his lips and kissing my knuckles. “It means building something instead of burying everything.”
“Even with gremlin apprentices and ley surges and raccoons that steal your boots?”
“Especially then.”
I smile.
Then lean up and kiss him.
It’s slow.
