Page 17 of Live To Tell

Rowan’s.

Don’t say it.

I frown. “Don't say what?”

His mouth parts. “What?”

“Yes. What? I hear your thoughts recently, which is another worry.”

He takes a ragged breath, lips hovering closer to mine again. “Something dumb.” His chest presses to me, lips softer in a ticklish way as they touch briefly.

“Nothing unusual there,” I say hoarsely. “Say what you want.”

“Fine,” he says quietly. “Violet, I have never wanted anything as badly as you.”

I take a sharp breath. This definitely isn’t only magic flowing between us—not the bond or whatever that stone is doing. “You have me.”

“All of you.” His weight leaves, and he sits on his haunches, as I lie back watching him, still struggling to breathe as if he’s still on me.

Rowan’s eyes are dark, breaths rapid. Has the stone done this? Pushed us into another place we avoid? “You don’t understand how much I love you, Violet.”

“I do.”

“How?”

I swallow. “I’ve learned from the way you look at me. The finding excuses to be around me—ensuring we spend time together as much as possible, like Holly does with Chase.” And other things I see with Holly and Chase. “Touches. Kisses. Everything that emanates from you when we’re together, and not only magic.” I prop myself up on my elbows. “Is that what I should understand is you loving me?”

“That isn’t the response I expected, Violet,” he says quietly. “You’re not claiming the bond causes how I feel. Are you beginning to understand that what we are together is more than magic?”

I prop myself up on my elbows. “I didn’t understand why people crave to be together so much that they would make illogical choices in life.”

He laughs softly. “And you’re one big illogical choice.”

“Yet here we are.” I sit forward and kneel opposite him. “You’re with the girl you swore you’d never choose because she ‘didn’t give a shit about anybody but herself.’”

“But I’d already started falling in love with that girl before the bond. You’re a force of nature that nobody can constrain, and I loved that. Everything about you pulled me in. I’d met my match, and I loved her from the first time she opened her beautiful, snarky mouth.”

“But the fighting? Like now—what was that? Something in this room wanted to swallow us. That... thing affected our minds and came between us.”

“Uh. Not when you tangled yourself with me, Violet.”

The flaming in my veins flares again. “You know what happens when we fight.”

“Yeah. I always wish we fought harder.” He rubs a thumb across my lips.

I fall silent, listening to my heart thudding in my ears. “I don’t want to cross a line, Rowan.”

“The one you crossed with Grayson?” he asks, suddenly wary. “You worry the potion won’t work against my blood if we get too intimate?”

“Do you?” I ask.

“Never,” he whispers and reaches out a hand. “What line do you mean?”

I shake my head, and his mouth parts. “Violet.” He runs fingers through my tangled hair, then the back of his hand against my flushed cheek. “If you did something while influenced by whatever the hell that stone evokes in us, I’d hate that.”

“But I’ve already crossed one line,” I say. “A place I never intended to go.”

“Just now?” he asks, wary again.

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