“How can I not?” I whisper softly.
He leans his head down against mine. “One day at a time, honey. And if that’s too hard—one step at a time. One breath. One heartbeat. I’m not promising that someday we’ll all look back at this time and laugh at how we agonized over our situation, but I do think there will come a time in which we’ll all have learned how to deal with it better.”
I swallow. “Will he be coming tonight?”
We’d decided to announce our good news to our loved ones at a dinner party at one of Astrid’s favorite restaurants. There will be no big wedding planned this time; in fact, we’re leaning toward doing it down at Karnach in the next month or so with just our closest friends and family present. Nothing fussy. Small is the way to go, we figure, when trying to lessen the devastating impact this blissful yet bittersweet occasion will bring to the other most important person in our lives.
“No.” He kisses my hair once more and pulls away. “I told him about it, though. I left the choice up to him on how he wants to handle all of this. He thinks it’ll be best for everyone involved if he stays at home tonight. But he wants you—us—to know, he’s done running.”
It is so incredibly selfish of me, but I’m glad Kellan won’t be coming. The entire time, I’d be so stressed worrying about him, wondering how he was feeling, that I’d probably make myself sick. That would only stress Jonah out and then Kellan, too; eventually they would do that dumb thing they do where they bend over backwards to try to make things right for me. In the end, it would be a miserable experience for all of us.
One heartbeat. One breath. I pull another in, count to ten. To twenty. I force myself to look at the beautiful ring on my finger, remember how I came to the choice I did. The happiness that fills me at such thoughts will always be bittersweet.
In this triangle, someone is always going to be hurting, and I hate that thought so much it makes me want to blow up everything in sight.
I force myself to focus on picking our furniture for the next hour. After we’d found some pieces we like, we head over to the sales counter. As Jonah schedules delivery times and pays for our items, I stare out the large glass windows at the front of the story. It’s the perfect sort of day in Annar, with soft white clouds gracing cool blue skies and gentle breezes tempering warm sunlight.
Just before I turn back to Jonah, a flash of bright, white hair in the group of people waiting at a stoplight across the street catches both my attention and my breath. A man stands there, one whose accusatory words have caused too many nightmares to count over the last year.
I blink, but he’s still there. Tall. Elegant. Grizzled goatee. White hair. Paler than I remember, wearing a long, black coat on a day when everyone else is packing away his or her outerwear. He’s standing across the street, an undecipherable smile on his thin lips as he stares right at me.
“Jonah,” I say quietly, tugging on his sleeve. “I know I’m out of the loop and all, but is Jens Belladonna back in Annar?”
The sales clerk hands him our paperwork. “No. He’s still classified as missing. Why?”
I turn back toward the window, but the man is no longer there.
I jog out of the store, ignoring Jonah’s concern. Once I’m out on the street, I search in every direction. That was Jens. I’m positive of it. Where could he have gone?
“Chloe, what’s going on?” Jonah asks when he joins me.
“I just saw Jens Belladonna.” I point across the street. “Right there. He was watching us.”
Jonah’s forehead furrows. “Maybe you just thought you saw somebody that looked like him?”
I go to argue, but as Fate would have it, another ghost from my past blocks our path. Which is just . . . fabulous.
“Well, look at this.” Sophie Greenfield’s smile is so cat-ate-the-canary smug. “Slumming again, Jonah?”
He closes his eyes briefly, but not before I see the anger he’s attempting to hide. “Sophie, we really don’t have time for this right now.”
She actually has the audacity to reach out, like she’s going to trail her horribly lovely fingers across his cheek. Unable to help myself, I slap her hand away. But this only exacerbates the haughty smile. “Did Jonah man up and tell you about what happened between us while you were gone?”
Jonah refuses to play her game, though. “We’re leaving now, Sophie. I advise you stay away from the both of us.”
“Did you know I was naked in his bed?” Sophie’s voice carries across the sidewalk as we walk away. “And that I loved it when he put his hands on me?”
I swing back around, furious. How dare she manipulate what happened like this—and in public no less! Just as I’m about to put her in her place, Jonah grabs my arms and says quietly, “Don’t engage her. It only makes it worse.”