Page 20 of Love By the Book
Rhianna
I spin in slow circles on my desk chair, watching the ceiling fan make its hypnotic rotation above me. My usual stack of half-read novels sits abandoned on my nightstand. I've tried three different books in the past hour, but none of them hold my attention.
With a sigh, I plant my foot and stop the spinning. My gaze drifts to the clock on my bedside table. Eli and Claire should be well into their museum tour by now. Not that I'm counting minutes or anything. Absolutely not. I'm definitely not wondering if they're having a marvelous time exploring Magnolia Cove's tame little museum, with Claire pointing out historical details in that earnest way of hers, Eli nodding thoughtfully, his glasses catching the light just so?—
Nope. Not thinking about that.
Though I am looking forward to dinner with him later. Just to hear how it went. For matchmaking evaluation purposes. Purely professional curiosity.
I spring up from the chair and flop onto my bed, arms splayed like a starfish washed ashore. Mr. Whiskers, who had beennapping in a patch of sunlight on my quilt, shoots me an offended glare before leaping away. "Sorry," I mutter, as if the cat understands or cares about my apology. As if explaining that I'm losing my mind over a man—a man I've known for a handful of days, no less—would somehow justify disturbing his precious slumber.
The house creaks around me, empty and too quiet. Dad's at the university, Mom and Gavin joined the Blackwoods on their boat for the day, and all my friends are either working or helping at the farmer's market. Which I'm specifically avoiding because a certain professor with ridiculously perfect hair might see me there after his date with Claire, and I refuse to seem like I'm hovering.
I roll onto my stomach and kick my feet in the air, feeling like a teenager waiting for her crush to call. Something hot and uncomfortable prickles under my skin. Is this what jealousy feels like? I barely recognize the sensation. I’m not supposed to feel this way.
I don’t get attached. Not anymore. Not after learning how much it hurts to let someone in and have them walk away anyway. So I keep things safe. Contained. Manageable.
Because if Eli really saw all of me—the highs, the lows, the mess—he’d leave. They always do.
This restless energy isn't jealousy. It can't be. It's just... anticipation. About dinner. About helping my client find his perfect match. Even if a traitorous part of me hopes Claire isn't it. And maybe there’s also a smug little voice in my head, the one that already knows their magic aligns, but doesn’t spark. Not like it does when it’s meant-to-be.
Not like our magic does when we’re together.
The thought slips in before I can stop it and I shove it down so fast, it nearly takes my breath with it.
I sit up and drum my fingers against my thigh, too fidgety to settle on any one task. My gaze falls on my desk,where the application for theWorld Library Tour Fellowshipsits half-completed.
"Focus on that," I tell myself. "That's your actual dream. Not some... summer fling with the new professor in town."
But the words feel hollow, even to my own ears. My fingers drumming picks up pace, my whole body twitching with the need to move, to distract myself from this inexplicable discomfort. The living room seems too empty, and yet my bedroom feels suddenly claustrophobic.
Before I fully realize it, my feet are already moving—down the stairs, through the back hallway, toward the door I deliberately avoid at all costs. My hand hovers over the crystal doorknob—the one Grandma Ida special-ordered because, "doorknobs should sparkle just like the people who turn them, Rhianna-bean."
The childhood nickname echoes in my head, and something cracks inside my chest.
I haven't been in this room for at least a year. After she died, I spent weeks curled up in her bed, breathing in her fading scent, sobbing until my throat was raw. Then came the months of avoidance—hurrying past the door, looking away when it entered my peripheral vision, pretending the room didn't exist. Now I can enter without dissolving into tears, but I still don't. Not often. Not without purpose.
What's my purpose now?
My fingers close around the doorknob, cool crystal pressing into my palm. The latch clicks, and I step inside.
The blinds are drawn shut, casting the space in gloomy shadows. It feels wrong. Grandma Ida hated closed blinds. "What's the point of windows if you block out the light?" she'd say, tugging the cords to flood the room with sunshine that would turn the hardwood floors golden and make her colorful quilts shimmer like jewels.
I cross to the window and pull the blinds up. Dust motesdance in the sudden beam of light, and I sneeze. The room smells stale, nothing like Grandma Ida’s potpourri of cinnamon gum, the floral perfume she ordered from a catalogue, and the endless varieties of tea she brewed in eclectic porcelain cups she picked up at antique stores.
"Sorry," I whisper to the empty room. "I should visit more."
My thoughts have been revolving around Eli all morning, and suddenly I'm here, in Grandma Ida's room, running my fingers over her quilts instead of obsessing over whether he's enjoying Claire's detailed explanation of our town's dubious historical artifacts.
I pause, the realization hitting me with uncomfortable clarity. Did I wander in here because I needed comfort, or because I needed a distraction? Is this what I'm doing? Using my grandmother's memory to distract myself from thinking about Eli? How messed up is that? No wonder Jacob ran. I really am too much.
Or maybe I'm here to remember. To remind myself why getting too close to anyone—especially someone like Eli Lancaster with his earnest eyes and his ridiculous music opinions and his way of making me feel both seen and heard in a way that terrifies me—is a terrible idea.
Because Jacob seemed like the best thing since cinnamon sugar toast at one point too. Our magic glistened together—maybe not like my magic does with Eli, but still. There was sparkle. There was hope. And Eli already admitted he ended a relationship when it got too routine. I read a book my mom recommended once that said we repeat patterns until we deal with our stuff. (The book used much fancier therapy words, but the point stands.)
That’s all this is. Me repeating a pattern. One that already burned me badly enough to leave a scar. And I’m not going tolet myself go through that again. I can’t. I’m not strong enough to survive that again.
I sink onto the edge of the bed, running my fingers over the quilt. I still remember sitting here as Grandma Ida brushed my hair before bed, telling me stories about the goddess I was named for. Rhiannon, forever riding her magical white horse, too swift for any suitor to catch.
