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His hazel eyes are a September night—bonfire-smoke rims, irises the color of golden firelight dancing on the last green leaves of summer. They are unfairly lovely.
Because under the autumn sun, Jamie’s dark blond hair is a stunning bronze, the faint promise of russet in the shadowy dips of his waves. His hazel eyes are emeralds slivered with gold, and everything about his tall, trim body seems even more statuesque. He’s the stuff of sculptures I stared at reverently in European museums, of artwork that made me fall in love with drawing the human form. In nature’s best lighting, Jamie Westenberg—I hate to admit—is nothing short of magnificent.
I’m a solitary daydreamer, often lost in my own world. I’m sensitive and easily startled. I have limits and boundaries that a lot of other people don’t. But I am capable of loving and being loved. I can share passion when the atmosphere is right. It just takes time.
Dammit. First, he’s a baby doctor. Now, he rescues zombie cats in their hour of undead need. Ugh.
Then it happens. It actually happens. Jamie smiles. It’s soft and small and crooked, but it’s there. I watch it unfurl, and my heart morphs into a gilded balloon that bursts, a shower of gold-leaf glitter sparkling in my chest.
He tucks a strand of hair behind my ear as the wind whips it across my face. “I don’t see you differently. I see you better.”
She loves something prickly, a bit daunting to approach at first. It unravels the ever-present anxious knot in my chest, a ball of relief unspooling through my limbs. If she can love that little creature, quills and all, maybe she could— No, not love. Of course not. But perhaps . . . understand me. How rare that would be.
You have to meet a living creature where they are, and love them for who they are, not who you want them to be.”
“You made four kinds of pureed veggie soup. For me.”
“My fake boyfriend isn’t supposed to ruin me for everyone else,” I whisper. Jamie’s eyes fall shut as he drops his forehead to mine. “Sometimes, Beatrice, I want to ruin you for everyone else.”
“You know it’s okay, right? For someone to see the best in you. For them to like the things you’re way too hard on yourself for.”
“I’m saying, you’re the best kind of chaos I’ve ever met. And while chaos used to terrify me, you make me crave it. I’m saying, even though this is an absurd situation we’ve backed ourselves into . . . I’d do it again in a heartbeat because it’s given me you.”
“I knew you’d be a spanker.”
“That was not a spank. That was a . . . a love tap.”
“It was a spank!”
“And I liked it!”
You’re the best thing in my life, I want to tell her. You’re safe and real and perfectly imperfect. We started as a lie, and now we’re the truest thing I’ve ever known.
I love her. Oh God, I love her. With each pound of my heart, the swell of the string quartet as the music builds, that’s the only thing I hear and feel—I love her. When haven’t I loved her?
“All I wanted was revenge,” she says softly, her hand settled over my heart. “And now all I want is you.”
A happy hum leaves her throat. “See? Your theory was disproved after all,” she whispers. “What theory was that?” “What you said the day we agreed to our revenge. Two wrongs don’t make a right.” She smiles. “I’d say we’ve proved they do.” I laugh as our fingers tangle, as I kiss her triumphant smile. “I have never been so glad to be wrong.”
“I could look at you forever,” he says roughly. “Learn what all of these little markings mean. Taste their path on your skin.”
I fell in love with you, so wildly, Bea. I love nothing in the world as I love you. And maybe you find that strange, but if you do . . . I hope it’s the best kind of strange, the kind that you might one day feel, too.”
