In the Likely Event

by Rebecca Yarros

“So this is what it takes to get your phone number? A girl has to haul herself into a war zone?”

“Like a piece of metal is keeping me out when I hear you scream.”

But douche or not, he was the one she’d chosen. I was just the one willing to fly into a combat zone for her.

“If no one’s trying to kill you here, then that means I’m doing my job over there. That’s how I choose to look at it, how I have to look at it.”

was no stranger to sex, but I’d never been kissed like this. He took my mouth like I was the key to his next heartbeat, with equal parts mind-blowing finesse and dizzying need.

“Izzy,” he groaned, his grip tightening in my hair to gently pull me away. The lust in his eyes dimmed the sting of rejection. “I don’t want hours. I want nights. Days. Weeks. I want to haul you into a room and lock us away until I know every inch of your body, taste everywhere you like to be kissed, explore every way to make you come, and then listen as your voice goes hoarse from screaming my name.

He kissed me like there was no one watching, and nothing waiting for us on the other side of tomorrow. “You know the best part of not defining this?” “My begrudging freedom?” I muttered. He laughed. “No. The possibilities, Izzy. That’s what we are. Possibility.”

I made a mistake giving in to what my parents wanted just because it was comfortable, because I thought I’d finally earn their approval. I made a mistake in settling for someone who obviously doesn’t know the meaning of love, or devotion, or exclusivity. I will never be what you want, and you will never give me what I deserve. I made a mistake when I said yes, and now I’m remedying it.”

It didn’t matter who I met, who I dated, or who I tried to love. Nate would always be in the way, even if he was never physically there. It was impossible to give away a heart I’d never gotten back in the first place.

I’d found out over the last year that my type was now Isabeau Astor. Not just blonde. Not just brown eyes. Not only quick wits and an infectious laugh. Not just a tendency to talk about fourteen subjects at once through lips softer than silk. Only the complete package of Izzy seemed to do it for me. No one else. I’d fallen for her a little harder with every letter, every secret she shared, every time she made me laugh.

“Aw, Nate.” She grinned, taking my face in her hands and pulling my attention from the credits. “You’re a romantic at heart.” I scoffed. “I’ve been accused of a lot of things, Isabeau. Being romantic isn’t one of them.”

“I’m not that guy.” He said it so softly that I barely heard him, so I knew the family behind us couldn’t. “What guy?” “Thirty seconds,” Gray called out from the end of our group. “The guy who does the honorable thing,” Nate said, his eyes searching mine. “Not when it comes to you.”