Chapter 7
Morning light stabbed through the curtains like a personal attack.
Sara groaned, pulling the pillow over her head, her brain pounding against her skull in steady, punishing waves. Her mouth tasted like regret and tequila, and her body felt like it had been put through a wringer.
What happened last night?
Pieces came back in fragments. The tavern. Posy and Varek. Drinks. Flirting with—who was it? A redheaded werewolf. Adrian.
And then—
Oh God.
She sat up so fast her stomach lurched. Her panic subsided only a little when she realized she was in her own bed and still wearing last night’s clothes, her shoes neatly placed beside the door.
Ben had carried her home. After she’d compared him to the Easter Bunny.
She dropped her face into her hands and groaned. What is wrong with me? How could she actually have said that? To his face?
And to add insult to injury, she was pretty sure she’d nuzzled his neck and told him he smelled good while he was carrying her like some kind of pathetic Victorian maiden.
Her phone buzzed on the nightstand, next to a glass of water and a bottle of painkillers that Ben must have placed there. She gulped two down as she reached for her phone.
POSY: You alive?
SARA: Barely. Please tell me last night was a fever dream.
POSY: Which part?
SARA: The part where I asked my grumpy neighbor to give out candy to my kindergarteners and compared him to the Easter bunny.
A long pause.
POSY: Yeah that definitely happened.
SARA: I’m never leaving this house again.
POSY: Don’t be dramatic. He carried you home like you were made of glass. It was actually really sweet.
SARA: He carried me home because I was making an idiot of myself in his bar.
POSY: You weren’t an idiot. You were tipsy and adorable and Adrian was loving every second of it.
SARA: Is that supposed to make me feel better?
POSY: Ben growled at him when he came back. Actually GROWLED. Varek said he’s never seen him like that.
She stared at the message, her pulse racing.
SARA: What does that mean?
POSY: It means he likes you, dummy.
SARA: He thinks I’m a disaster.
POSY: Honey, those two things aren’t mutually exclusive.
She groaned again and set down her phone without responding. Her head was still pounding, her stomach still churning, but underneath all of it was a strange, persistent flutter in her chest.
Ben had carried her home. He’d removed her shoes and tucked her into bed. He’d left her in her own bed, fully clothed, and gone back to the tavern to growl at Adrian. Why?
She didn’t know. She didn’t know anything, except that she’d made a complete fool of herself and somehow she was going to have to look him in the eye for the rest of her time in Fairhaven Falls.
Moving very slowly, she took a long hot shower, then peeked cautiously into the living room. The curtains were still open and she could see his cottage through the window, but there was no sign of life.
I should go over there and apologize like a mature adult, she thought. Or maybe I should just pretend it never happened.
Saturday passed in a haze of hydration and self-recrimination. Sunday, she stayed inside, going over her student’s papers and watching bad television and definitely not looking out the window every five minutes.
She heard the rumble of his truck pulling into the driveway once, followed by the sound of his front door closing, but she didn’t go over to his house. She didn’t leave cookies. She didn’t do anything except hide like a coward.
This is ridiculous, she told herself Sunday night, lying in bed and staring at the ceiling. I’m a grown woman. I had a few drinks, said something embarrassing, and he helped me get home safely. People do this all the time.
Except it didn’t feel that simple. It felt like something had shifted between them, something she didn’t quite understand.
Monday morning, she threw herself into work. The kids were rambunctious after the weekend, full of energy and stories about what they’d done, and their cheerful chaos helped settle her nerves. This, at least, she knew how to do. This, she was good at.
By afternoon, she’d almost convinced herself that everything was fine.
And then the door to her classroom opened.
The children had been released fifteen minutes ago, the room quiet except for the scratch of her pen as she updated her lesson plans. She didn’t look up immediately, assuming it was a parent with a question, or Tricia coming to check in on her.
“Miss Cartwright.”
Her pen slipped at the sound of the familiar deep voice, ink smearing across the page.
Ben stood in the doorway of her classroom, tall and broad-shouldered and looking deeply out of place among the tiny desks and finger paintings. His ears brushed the top of the doorframe. His blue eyes were fixed on her with an intensity that made her breath catch.
“Ben.” She stood too quickly, almost knocking her chair over. “What are you… How did you…”
“Tricia let me in.”
“Oh.” Of course she had. Tricia would simply have assumed he was a parent.
Silence stretched between them. Her heart was hammering so loud she was sure he could hear it with those ridiculous ears.
“I came to apologize,” he said finally.
“You came to apologize?”
“I shouldn’t have—” He paused, jaw tight. “I overreacted. At the tavern. You were just enjoying yourself, and I…”
“Carried me home like a sack of potatoes?”
His eyes darkened, a flash of something that looked like hunger flaring in their depths. “You’re most definitely not a sack of potatoes.”
“That’s what it felt like,” she muttered, but she knew she was lying.
“You may not believe it, but I was trying to help.”
“By manhandling me in front of the entire bar?”
“By getting you out of there before you said something else you’d regret.” He took a step into the room, and the space seemed to shrink around him. “Before I did something I’d regret.”
Her mouth went dry. “What does that mean?”
He didn’t answer. His eyes swept the classroom instead—the bright artwork on the walls, the reading corner with its overstuffed pillows, the tiny chairs that would never hold someone his size.
“This is where you work with the children,” he said quietly.
“Yes.”
“They’re lucky to have you.”
Something cracked in her chest. “Ben—”
“The Easter thing.” He cut her off, still not looking at her. “I shouldn’t have reacted like that. You didn’t know.”
“Know what?”
His jaw worked as silence filled the room again.
“I used to be someone else,” he said finally. “Someone who performed, who let people turn him into… a character rather than a person. That is not who I am anymore, but it felt as if you were seeing me that way.”
Her chest ached as she thought about the unused stage at the tavern and the voice that had made her cry in the moonlight.
“I wasn’t trying to make you into a character,” she said softly. “I just thought that the kids would love you, and—”
“I know.” He finally met her eyes, and the look in them stole her breath. “That’s what makes it worse. You meant it kindly, and I still threw it in your face.”
“Ben—”
“I’m not good at this.” The words came out rough, almost reluctant. “I’ve been alone a long time. By choice.”
“Okay.”
“But you keep…” He made a frustrated sound. “You keep showing up, smiling at me and bringing me food. Do you have any idea what that means? What you’re doing?”
She shook her head slowly.
“To most Others,” he said, stepping closer still, “the offer of food is significant. It’s… an invitation. A promise of care. A sign of interest.”
Interest. The word hung in the air between them.
“Oh.” Her face was on fire. “Flora didn’t mention that.”
“Flora knows exactly what she’s doing,” he said dryly. “Which is why she keeps telling you to feed me.”
“So all this time, when I was just trying to be neighborly…”
“You were unintentionally proposing a relationship.”
“Oh God.” She buried her face in her hands. “I am so, so sorry. I never would have—”
“It’s all right.”
“No, it’s not.” Her muffled voice was full of mortification. “This is worse than the bunny food. First, I accidentally insult you, then I accidentally propose, and then I get drunk and compare you to a giant rodent who hands out chocolate eggs. I’m a disaster.”
A low sound rumbled in his chest. When she finally looked up, she realized he was laughing. Not a full-throated laugh, but a quiet, rusty sound that transformed his face, softening the hard edges and crinkling the corners of those blue eyes.
“It’s… refreshingly honest,” he said. “If nothing else.”
“I’m pretty sure ‘refreshingly honest’ is just a polite way of saying ‘a complete train wreck.’”
“A very appealing train wreck.” His voice went deep and low.
“Which is part of the problem. My brain understands that you aren’t doing these things deliberately, but the Other side of me, the part that is driven by instinct, doesn’t care about intent.
It just smells sugar and vanilla and a delicious little female who keeps feeding it, and it wants to… ”
He trailed off, looking away from her again, a muscle flexing in his jaw. He stood so close she could feel the warmth radiating from his body, and she realized with a jolt that he wasn’t just uncomfortable. He was restraining himself.
“Wants to what?” she asked, her voice barely a whisper.
His head snapped back towards her, blue eyes intense and burning. “Take what you’re offering.”
Heat pooled deep in her belly, a slow, languid warmth that had nothing to do with embarrassment. She should be scared. Or at the very least, she should back away. But she didn’t. She held her ground, her gaze locked with his, feeling something ancient and powerful stirring between them.
“You’re not offering,” he added quickly, as if he had to remind them both. “I know that. It’s just… complicated.”
“Complicated,” she repeated, tasting the word. “Ben—”
The classroom door banged open.
“Miss Sara! I forgot my—oh!”
Sara jerked back as if she’d been burned, her face flaming, as Maisie rushed into the room. Ben moved even faster, putting the length of the room between them before she could blink.
“Maisie.” Her voice came out shaky. “What did you forget, sweetheart?”
The little girl was staring at Ben with wide eyes, her forgotten lunchbox clutched to her chest, a gap-toothed smile slowly spreading across her face.
“You’re a bunny,” she breathed.
Ben’s ears twitched. “I’m—”
“A big fluffy bunny!” Maisie darted across the room before Sara could stop her, wrapping her arms around Ben’s leg. “Can I pet you? Please, please, please?”
Sara watched, frozen, as Ben looked down at the tiny elf child attached to his shin. Something shifted in his face—the hard edges softening, the tension in his shoulders easing just slightly.
“I’m not—” he started.
“Please?” Maisie’s voice was pure, weaponized adorableness. “My mommy says bunnies are soft.”
Ben looked at her. She looked back, a smile tugging at the corners of her mouth, and gave him a helpless shrug.
“Only if Mr. Ben says it’s okay,” she said, trying to be the responsible adult in the room.
His gaze dropped to Maisie, who was gazing up at him with hero-worship in her enormous eyes. He let out a quiet sigh, the sound of a male who had fought a battle and lost before it even began, and slowly bent down to her level.
“You may touch my ear,” he said gruffly. “Very gently.”
Maisie squealed with delight and extended a small hand, her fingers brushing the velvet tip of one tall ear. Her face lit up like Christmas morning.
“You really are fluffy,” she announced, her voice full of wonder. “And tall. Taller than Billy’s daddy, and he’s a troll.”
She had to press her lips together to keep from laughing.
“Okay, Maisie,” she managed, her voice only slightly strained. “You’ve got your lunchbox. Time to find your mom.”
“But—”
“She’ll be waiting. And Mr. Ben was just leaving.”
“Oh.” Maisie’s face fell. “Will you come back, Mr. Ben?”
Ben’s eyes found hers across the room. In their depths, she saw a flash of something that looked suspiciously like panic.
“I’m… very busy,” he said.
“But you could come to our party!” Maisie’s face lit up again. “Miss Sara is going to have a party and we’re going to have candy and games and you should be the guest of honor! Will you come?”
He didn’t answer. He straightened slowly, looking at her once more.
“Maybe,” he said finally. “If I’m invited.”
Maisie beamed and scampered out the door, lunchbox swinging, leaving a charged silence behind.
“She’s a determined little thing,” she said into the quiet. “I’m sorry about that.”
He didn’t answer. He just stood there, looking at the spot where Maisie had stood. His shoulders, which had been so tense, were now slumped.
“I have to go,” he said abruptly, turning towards the door. “But I’ll think about the party.”
Her heart leapt. “Really?”
“I said I’ll think about it.” But there was a warmth in his voice that hadn’t been there before. “Don’t push it.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it.”
“Liar.”
He was gone before she could respond, his footsteps echoing down the hallway, and she sank into her chair, her knees suddenly giving way.
My instincts want to take what you’re offering.
She pressed a hand to her chest, feeling her heart pound beneath her palm.
Oh, she was in so much trouble.