“Uh, I wasn’t exactly invited,” I shrugged. It was probably just an oversight. Tristan thought Piper would invite me, Piper thought Tristan would say something, and Lincoln didn’t care if I showed up or not.
“Sure, you’re invited.” Tristan looked genuinely uncomfortable. “I was going to invite you, I just…”
“Oh, no, please stop,” I begged. “Don’t make this worse.”
“What do you mean?” Suddenly his eyes were a sharp, vibrant color staring expectantly at me.
“It’s just so awkward right now.” I gave him a pained smile. “Don’t make it worse. Please.”
Tristan let out a bark of laughter and surprised me by pulling me hard against his chest. “God, I’ve missed you.”
My arms slid around his waist and I hugged him tightly. “I’ve missed you too!” I squeezed him tighter. “Can we go back to normal now?”
I felt his body deflate in my arms, as if I asked the hardest question in the world, but eventually he whispered against my hair, “Yes, we can.”
I pulled back and looked up into his fathomless eyes and searched for truth. He met my intent gaze and didn’t hide from me like he had been doing for the last two weeks.
“I don’t want to lose you too, Tristan,” I whispered, feeling raw and exposed from the acute pain stabbing at my chest.
“You won’t,” he promised quickly. “You didn’t. It’s hard for me to accept that ‘normal’ for us is just friendship, but I’m getting there. I miss you too much to stay this narcissistic.” He grinned then and it was the familiar, heart-stopping smile I knew and loved.
“That is very good news,” I laughed.
“I’ll pick you up tonight? We can go to Lincoln’s together?” He pulled out of my arms and started walking back.
“I would like that,” I agreed.
Another one of his grins and then he turned around and left me to my car. It wasn’t perfect, not even close to normal and definitely not where I wanted it to be- but our friendship would survive. He would survive this.
And I realized how utterly happy that made me. It wasn’t just that he wasn’t a future for me, that he would hold me back from my true purpose and die long before I hit my Angel-prime. It was that I would hold him back too. If he stayed in love with me, he would never experience a full life: a life of college, dating, marriage, kids, growing old with someone he truly loved. He would forever stand in my shadow and be passed over for obligations and world-ending problems.
Sure, there was love between us. But there wasn’t a life in that love. And because we walked away early, he could still experience that.
In some ways, I was jealous of him. I was completely envious of the simplicity of his life, of the hopes and dreams he could look forward to.
My life would never be that easy- my love never laid-back or straightforward.
He was living a better life without me taking up most of it. He would live a better life without me in it.
I turned around to get in my driver’s seat and that’s when I saw him. He was across the highway, with his hands in his pockets, watching me intently. My heart stopped in my chest and I immediately went over my checklist of weapons- two katanas under my driver’s seat, a long dagger at my thigh. My butterfly knife was gone, but there was another broadsword in my trunk if I needed it.
But he never made a move toward me. He just kept staring.
After a few more moments, he stepped back, disappearing behind the side of the one Mead bank. I felt him go, in my bones I felt his presence disappear from my life.
He was gone now, but he would be back. He would always come back. He could no more stay away from me than I could kill him.
This love, our connection, our consuming need for each other was so strong it would always bind us together. Even if it was damaged, even if it was stained and polluted for now.
It wouldn’t always be.
I had to believe that. I had to believe it would become good again, just like Seth would.
And that I wouldn’t always be alone in this fight against Evil. I wouldn’t always be without the one man that would make this future worth fighting for and this destiny worth accepting.
The next year would be the hardest battle of my life, but the reward was worth the fight. And I would always fight for Seth. Even after there wasn’t anything left for me, there would always be Seth.
And I would fight for him.
I would fight for us.
Acknowledgments
Praise always goes to my God first. Without Him, there would be no books, there would be no stories. He is the reason I write, the reason I create.
To my husband, Zach- the greatest man I know. Thank you for your support, your encouragement and your pep talks. You have been my rock through this whole journey and my reason when I can’t seem to find my own.
To my mom, who babysits for hours upon hours and demands to read my books first. Thank you for being my number one fan, for believing in each one of my stories and for always being there when I need you. I would be so blessed to be a mother like you one day.
To my Stella, you inspired this story and you are the reason I started writing in the first place. I love you, baby girl.
To Carolyn, thank you for all your work! Thank you for putting up with my dashes and finding every place that needed commas. Thank you for making me figure out what I really meant to say. You have an incredible eye! I am so blessed by your skill.
To Sarah Hansen, at Okay Creations, thank you for your general and exceptional awesomeness. You have a way with covers that turns a pretty picture into extraordinary art. You take my concepts and make them gorgeous realities and I am so grateful for your talent!
To Candice, thank you for taking my roughest drafts and finding something good in them! Thank you for your opinion day and night. And thank you for talking me down off the ledge when I am freaking out like a crazy person.
To Diana, thank you for sharing my books with your family and friends and anyone you meet! Thank you for doing your share of editing and finding all my sinful homonyms. And thank you for including my family in your Zombie-Apocalypse escape plan.
To Jenn, thank you for loving Seth so fiercely and for all your threatening texts. Most of all, thank you for missing Jupiter.
To my Hellcats, Georgia Cates, Amy Bartol, Lila Felix, Shelly Crane, Angeline Kace, Quinn Loftis, Michelle Leighton and Samantha Young. You girls are the greatest people I know. Thank you for listening to every exciting thing and sharing that with me, thank you for enduring my insecurities and problems and offering advice and a listening ear. And thank you for having my back, always. You girls have made this independent life into a community of friendship and support and I am so grateful for each and every one of you!
To my Rebels!!! Girls, you are seriously the best team anyone could ask for. Your unending support and excitement for everything I do encourages me daily and gives me energy to keep up this crazy schedule!! I love and listen to your advice and I am blessed to know you all. You’re more than readers, more than a street team. You are friends. And more than my books, I’m grateful for this team so that I can call each of you one.
And to the readers, THANK YOU. This was a pipe dream to me, a someday-maybe-hopefully-thing, and you made it into my reality. Thank you for taking a chance on Stella and Seth and falling in love with them as hard as I did. But most of all, thank you for taking a chance on me. I could not do this without you!!!