Page 21 of Second Chance with the Half-Elf
Then shove the box sideways with my foot.
“Found a letter,” I bite out. “From my mother. To your uncle.”
Shock flickers in his gaze. “What did it say?”
“That she ran,” I snap. “That she couldn’t stay. Sound familiar?”
A muscle ticks in his jaw. “I’m not him.”
“And I’m not her.”
The words come fast, hot.
“But this? You and me? It’s the same damn pattern.”
“Is it?” he says, voice low and dark.
“Yeah,” I hiss. “You stay. I run. We break things that can’t be fixed.”
He steps closer—close enough that the air hums sharp between us.
“I don’t think that’s what this is.”
I snort. “Spare me the fairy tale.”
“Evie—” His tone roughens. “You gonna keep running?”
“I don’t know how to stay.”
There it is. Ugly and raw and too damn true.
His gaze softens, mouth a breath from mine.
“Then let me show you.”
The words burn through me—wild, reckless, terrifying.
And when he leans in, slow and sure, I don’t pull away.
Our mouths meet fierce, breathless—salt and want and years of ache crashing in a tidal wave.
My hands fist in his soaked shirt, his arms band around me hard enough to shake the storm from my bones.
The kiss isn’t sweet. It’s desperate. It’s all teeth and gasps and tangled need.
I taste the sea on him. Feel the heat of him pressed to every sharp angle of me.
And for a long, wild moment—I don’t care about history. Don’t care about patterns.
Just this. Him.
Too soon, reality claws back in.
The lights flicker once, then buzz back weakly to life.
I jerk back, breath ragged.
“Aeron—”
