Chapter Seven
I WAKE UP SLOWLY.
Not the sharp jolt of alarm I've been experiencing every morning since I arrived here, where consciousness hits like cold water and I spend the first thirty seconds trying to remember where I am and why.
This is different. This is warmth seeping through my bones, a cocoon of silk sheets and something solid behind me, and a hand splayed across my stomach like it belongs there.
Devyn.
His chest is pressed against my back. His breath stirs my hair. His arm is wrapped around me, possessive even in sleep, and I can feel his heartbeat through my skin—steady, slow, the rhythm of a man who isn't worried about anything.
I lie very still, cataloging the sensations like a photographer sorting through shots.
The heat of him along my spine. The weight of his arm.
The way my body fits against his like we were designed to slot together, which is ridiculous because we weren't, we're strangers who got married yesterday, strangers who—
His arm tightens.
I stop breathing.
He pulls me closer, a sleepy, instinctive motion, and his mouth brushes the back of my neck. Not quite a kiss. Just contact. Just his lips against my skin, warm and soft, and every nerve ending I have sits up and pays attention.
"Mmm." The sound vibrates against my neck. "You're awake."
"How can you tell?"
"You stopped breathing."
I start breathing again, pointedly, and he makes a sound that might be a laugh. It rumbles through his chest and into my back, and I feel it everywhere.
"I wasn't—I was just—"
He turns me in his arms.
One motion. Efficient. Suddenly I'm facing him, and the morning light is catching the gold in his eyes, and his hair is mussed from sleep in a way that makes him look almost human. Almost approachable.
Almost.
"Good morning," he says.
"Good morning."
We stare at each other.
His gaze drops to my mouth.
Seventh time. I'm still counting.
And then he kisses me.
Soft. Slow. Nothing like the claiming kisses from last night. This is gentle in a way I didn't know he could be, his hand coming up to cup my face, his thumb tracing along my cheekbone like I'm something precious.
When he pulls back, I've forgotten my own name.
"That's a nice way to wake up—"
It’s only when I see the corner of his mouth twitch did I realize what I’ve just blurted out.
Argh.
"I mean—" I start, and then stop, because his eyes are very gold this close, and his hand is still on my face, and I'm suddenly aware that I'm not wearing anything under this sheet. "It's—yes. It's nice. You're—"
Oh my gosh, Bailey. Do not tell him he's good at kissing.
"—very warm," I finish. "Temperature-wise. You're like a furnace. It's very—"
I'm going to stop talking now.
His almost-smile spreads into something real. Something that makes my stomach flip.
"Warm," he repeats.
"Forget I said anything."
"I don't think I will."
"Can we start this conversation over?"
"No."
"You're enjoying this."
"Very much."
I want to bury my face in the pillow, but that would require breaking eye contact, and somehow I can't make myself do that either.
“Can we pretend the last sixty seconds didn’t happen?”
“Never.”
But he’s smiling at me when he says this, and my heart...it just can’t bear how beautiful he looks right now.
Is this man truly my husband?
The thought hits differently in daylight. Last night, wrapped in darkness and his hands and that strange magic of becoming, it felt like a dream. Something happening outside of time. But now the sun is streaming through the windows, and his eyes are gold in the light, and I just...
I still can’t believe it.
This man is my husband.
But...
This man also harbors suspicions about someone sending me.
Who sent you, Bailey?
The question from last night echoes in my chest. He asked it in the dark, after everything, when I was still drifting in that hazy space between consciousness and sleep. I pretended not to hear. Pretended I'd already fallen asleep.
But I heard.
And I don't know how to answer him with words he'd believe.
brEAKFAST ARRIVES ON a silver tray: croissants, fresh fruit, coffee that smells like heaven. We eat together—him scanning documents, me trying not to stare at the way his fingers hold a pen.
I check my phone while he reviews a second stack of papers. Force of habit. My audiobook app is still open to Olympus Bewitched, paused mid-chapter from—
From before. From my old life. From the last time I needed a door out.
"What is that?"
I look up. Devyn's eyes are on my screen, on the book cover with Blair's silhouette and the shadowy figure of a man behind her.
"Just an audiobook. I've listened to it a million times."
“Because it’s hard to understand?”
“Because it’s comforting.”
"And the man on the cover?"
"Mr. Handsome?" I can't help the smile. "He's the love interest. Very mysterious. Very brooding. Blair—that's the heroine—she's completely obsessed with him."
"Mr. Handsome."
"That's what Blair calls him—”
“Then let Blair call him that, not you.”
I just have to laugh. “You almost have me thinking you’re jealous.”
“Don’t be absurd.”
“It’s just...the way you sound, I suppose.”
"Book obsessions are unhealthy." He returns to his documents with pointed focus. "You should find better coping mechanisms."
Honestly, if I didn’t know any better, I’d really think this king of mine is jealous of a fictional character. But that’s totally ridiculous. Right?
Devyn says he has to leave for work after breakfast, and my heart skips a beat when he cups my chin. Is he going to kiss me? Is he going to—
“Stay out of trouble.”
—warn me like I’m no different from a kid?
Bummer.
The estate feels too empty the moment Devyn leaves. I resume exploring my new home, partly to kill some time, but also in hopes that maybe, just maybe I’ll find my way back to a certain magical bookshop.
I walk the perimeter of the garden, keeping my eyes open for anything unusual. A door that shouldn't be there. A shimmer in the air. A brass lantern glowing where no lantern should glow.
Nothing.
Fine. Maybe I need to try harder.
I stop in the middle of the path, close my eyes, and feel incredibly stupid as I whisper: "Hewhay's? Are you there? I could really use some help."
I open my eyes.
A hedge stares back at me.
Cool. Very helpful.
Maybe I need to be more specific. More intentional. In the books I've read—the portal fantasy books, the ones where girls fall through wardrobes and stumble into other worlds—there's usually some kind of trigger. A word. A gesture. A moment of desperate need.
I'm desperate. Does that count?
I look around to make sure no one's watching. Then, feeling absolutely ridiculous, I raise my hand and wave it in a vaguely mystical pattern.
"Abracadabra?"
Nothing.
"Open sesame?"
A bird chirps mockingly from somewhere above me.
"Hocus pocus?"
The hedge continues to be a hedge.
I slump against a stone bench and groan.
This is pointless. Hewhay's isn't going to appear just because I want it to. It's magic—real magic, the kind that doesn't follow rules—and I'm standing in a garden talking to shrubbery like a crazy person.
But then I think about Harry Potter.
Platform 9?. You had to run at a solid wall, trusting that magic would catch you. You had to believe, even when every logical part of your brain was screaming that you were about to concuss yourself on bricks.
Maybe that's what this requires. Not words. Not gestures.
Faith.
I stand up. Square my shoulders. Look at the garden wall—solid stone, covered in ivy.
This is a terrible idea.
This is the worst idea I've ever had, and I've had some spectacular ones, including drinking mystery tea from a shop that shouldn't exist and accidentally agreeing to marry a mafia king.
But I'm going to do it anyway.
I take a breath. Close my eyes. Think about Hewhay's—the warmth, the light, the smell of cream cheese garlic buns and old paper and possibility.
And I run.
Straight at the wall.
Full speed.
Believing with everything I have that—
THUNK.
Ow.
Ow.
I stumble backward, hand flying to my forehead, stars dancing in my vision.
Not Platform 9?.
Definitely just a wall.
A very solid, very unmagical wall that has now left what I'm pretty sure is going to be a spectacular bruise on my forehead.
I sink down onto the grass and press my palm against the throbbing spot above my eyebrow.
Okay. So. That didn't work.
Good to know. Very valuable information. I've learned something today, and what I've learned is that I am an idiot.
The bird chirps again. I swear it's laughing at me.
"You're not helping," I inform it with dignity.
I SPEND THE REST OF the day with ice on my forehead and a growing sense of frustration.
Hewhay's isn't going to appear on command. Fine. That was always a long shot.
But there's still Abigail's journal. There's still the mystery of what actually happened to her. And there's still that passage behind the chapel—the one she disappeared into, the one I only explored partway before I found the journal and retreated.
Maybe I missed something.
Tomorrow. I'll go back tomorrow, when my head isn't throbbing and my pride isn't quite so bruised.
For now, I need to figure out how to hide this bump from my husband.
DINNER IS A QUIET AFFAIR. Devyn is distracted, but I don’t ask questions. If there’s something he wants me to know, he’ll tell me. So for now, I let it be. I’d rather not have his attention on me anyway.
Except...
When we’re back in our bedroom, I make the mistake of washing my face.
I'm standing at the sink, water dripping from my chin, when I push my hair back without thinking. Just a quick swipe to get it out of my eyes.
"What is that?"
I freeze.
Devyn is behind me, reflected in the mirror. He's already changed out of his jacket, his shirt unbuttoned at the collar, and his eyes are locked on my forehead.
On the bruise I've been hiding all day.
"What is what?" I try.