Chapter 13
Skyla
The black sand of Rockaway Beach stretches before us like a bolt of midnight silk unfurled against the churning gray sea.
Waves thunder against the shore in a primal rhythm that perfectly matches the pounding of my heart, and judging by the way his pulse jumps beneath my fingertips, it matches Gage’s heart, too.
The scent of salt mingles with the pine-laden air, the smells of home and exile all at once.
Gage’s black truck idles in the nearly empty parking lot, the engine ticking as it cools. It feels like a greeting from an old friend. This vehicle that carried us through countless adventures before being replaced by something newer, shinier, in a future that now seems impossibly distant.
“Ready?” Gage asks, his dimples carving twin hollows into his cheeks as he smiles.
“As I’ll ever be,” I say, trying not to think about how I texted Logan right before we left, letting him know where we were headed as if I might need backup.
This is Gage, for Pete’s sake—the love of my life, or one of them anyway.
Both Gage and Logan made up my whole heart, right up until the kids arrived.
Then my heart simply grew to accommodate them all.
We step out into Paragon’s eternal gray haze. The island has always been moody and melancholy, wreathed in a fog that hugs the evergreens as if it were about to leave them. But we all know the truth—the fog is trapped here, much like the residents.
Gage leads us down the wooden steps to the beach with a blanket tucked under one arm. His free hand finds mine, warm against the perpetual chill of Rockaway. The ebony sand crunches beneath our feet like sooted snow, and that has always struck me as both ironic and slightly ominous.
“What’s going on in that head of yours?” Gage asks, squeezing my hand. “You’ve been quiet ever since I picked you up.”
“Just thinking,” I say, which isn’t a lie.
I’m thinking about how surreal it is to be seventeen again, to be with this younger version of Gage who has no idea what’s coming—faction wars, celestial battles, the complicated evolution of our relationship, the highs, the lows, the paternity reveals, the deaths.
Come to think of it, Gage might have opted for death in lieu of the paternity reveal that’s coming his way.
“Thinking can be a dangerous pastime.” He winks, spreading the blanket across a relatively flat expanse of sand. The roaring waves crash over the shoreline just yards away, sending plumes of spray into the air like watery fireworks.
We settle onto the blanket, and Gage’s arm automatically circles my waist as he pulls me close. It feels so good, so familiar. His body radiates heat like a furnace, his chest is comfortable to lean on, and all around, Gage Oliver feels like home.
“Thanks for coming out here,” Gage says quietly. “I know it’s freezing.”
“Since when has a little cold stopped me?” I ask, though I’m definitely shivering.
“Since never. You’re stubborn like that.” He rubs my arms to warm them. “Here, take my jacket.”
“Then you’ll be cold.”
“I’ll survive. Besides,” he says, already shrugging it off, “you look cute when you’re drowning in my clothes.”
“Drowning is a strong word,” I protest as he wraps the jacket around me. It smells like him—cedar and ocean and something distinctly Gage.
“Fine. Swimming. Slightly treading water.”
I elbow him gently. “You’re such a romantic.”
“I brought you to a freezing beach in the fog,” he points out. “Romance might not be my strong suit.”
“I don’t know,” I say, snuggling into his jacket. “This feels pretty perfect.”
He looks down at me with an expression that makes my chest ache, knowing what’s coming. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“So,” he says, his breath warm against my ear, “what was so important that you had to tell Brielle before leaving yesterday?”
It takes me a second to remember the excuse I’d given him to avoid our intimate encounter. “Just girl stuff,” I say vaguely, spinning in his arms to face him. “You know how it is.”
“I definitely don’t,” he laughs, “but I’ll take your word for it.”
His fingers trace patterns on my waist through my jacket, and I can feel the heat even through the layers. The way he’s looking at me—like I’m something precious and dangerous at the same time—makes my stomach flip.
“You keep looking at me like that,” I say.
“Like what?”
“Like you’re trying to memorize me.”
“Maybe I am.” His voice drops lower. “Is that a problem?”
“Depends what you’re planning to do with those memories.”
Something shifts in his expression, darker, hungrier. “Come here and find out.”
I don’t move. “I’m already here.”
“Not close enough,” he says, and then he’s pulling me against him properly, no space between us. His hand slides up to cup my face, thumb brushing across my cheekbone. “Never close enough.”
“Gage—”
His lips find mine before I can formulate a better answer.
The kiss is sweet, familiar, and charged with all the longing that our teenage years demanded.
The kiss starts soft but quickly turns into something else—desperate, consuming.
His hands are in my hair as if he were trying to get impossibly closer.
He kisses like he’s trying to tell me something words can’t capture, and my body remembers exactly how to answer.
For a moment, I get lost in it, in him, before guilt crashes over me like those waves battering the shore.
GAH! What the hell am I doing?
Technically, it’s our time, but I’m not really the Skyla that belonged to Gage anymore. I’m a married woman, a mother, kissing my ex-husband in a time before he became my husband and then my ex. The temporal ethics are enough to make my head spin.
I pull back, disguising the fact I’m retreating by tucking a strand of hair behind my ear.
“Skyla,” he says, my name like a prayer or a curse, I can’t tell which.
“What’s wrong?” His brows knit together, but there’s a darker undercurrent there as if he suspects something.
As he should. “Does this have something to do with what happened yesterday? I saw the way Logan was looking at you, touching you, as if we didn’t exist.”
There’s a hard edge to his voice I’ve only heard on the few occasions he’s been rabidly jealous, and I’m pretty sure this falls in that category. The Oliver boys might have made an unholy arrangement to share me, but neither of them likes it. Not that I’m supposed to be with Logan at the moment.
A thought hits me.
Oh my word, what if he knows? Or at least he suspects. Or at the least he wants to rip Logan’s head off. But then, that’s about a once-a-week occurrence if I remember correctly. And that sort of carries on into the future as well.
I press my lips tight, searching for the right words.
“Gage, we will always exist, no matter where Logan is in our lives.” I take a deep breath, committing to a truth that spans just about every timeline.
Wait—did I just sound too adult? Did I make any sense? Maybe I should offer to rip Logan’s head off with him? I’m sure Gage would appreciate the camaraderie.
Maybe I should lead with the truth? After all, it’s so outrageously delicious it will probably sound as if I’m teasing him.
“Gage, that prediction you made about us getting married? You were right.” I bite down a smile.
“We are most certainly going to get married. We’re going to have kids, three of them.
” I leave out the part about having them all at once—or the fact that one of them tries her hardest to end me.
No need to give the poor guy a heart attack.
“What?” He leans in, squinting over at me as if wondering if I’m having a medical episode of some kind. If only it were that easy.
But then the verbal diarrhea continues. “We’re going to be intimate on far more levels than just physical.
” I’m quick to spill the sexy beans. “But believe me, the physical part will be pretty amazing. Like mind-blowingly amazing.” I close my eyes for a moment as every last mind-blowing memory washes over me.
Gage really is that good in bed. “Dizzying at times. Acrobatic, in fact. So freaking am—”
My phone bleats, interrupting my sexual soliloquy dedicated to Gage’s body—or before I can give an honorable mention to that baseball bat of his—and, of course, I was just about to list the other nonsexual ways he’ll love me.
The man has a standing order with the only florist on the island.
There is an endless parade of lavender roses and peonies at my house, and it is all thanks to the dark-haired Oliver.
I pluck the phone from my purse and see a text from Marshall.
Ms. Messenger
I flash it to Gage and shrug. “He always did have perfect timing.”
“Freaking Dudley,” Gage growls in response.
Come to think of it, that’s still his response whenever Marshall comes around, and seeing as Marshall comes around just about every single day, Gage spends a lot of his free time growling at the surly Sector.
Typically, spicier expletives are employed, but in Gage’s defense, Marshall usually warrants them.
Before I can continue where I left off by spilling details of the future as much as possible for poor Gage, a pair of headlights shines in the parking lot up above, then another, and another.
Soon, half of West seems to be trotting down this way with Logan grinning in the middle of the melee.
And I have a sneaking suspicion he’s the leader of the pack.
Why break up your wife’s romantic date on the beach alone, when you can bring backup?
Why do I get the feeling letting him know where Gage and I were headed was a mistake?
Although, on the other hand, I’m pretty much absolved from trying to evade Gage’s sexual efforts.
And to think all those years ago, it was me who was the aggressor.
Though I guess being cockblocked by my own husband and his entourage beats having to explain why I’m not in the mood for beach sex.
Teenage me would die knowing I’m actively avoiding what she desperately wanted.
Believe me, if I weren’t a happily married woman, I wouldn’t be regaling Gage Oliver with snippets about the future.
I’d be regaling him with my body as we got down and dirty in the sand.
These teenage hormones don’t care about my marriage certificate—they’re working with the original operating system.
Gage leans in and lands a kiss on my temple before brushing his lips over my ear. “Why do I get the feeling I’m being friend-zoned?”
My mouth falls open, but before I can answer, Brielle squeals as she lands on the blanket next to us, followed by Michelle, Lexy, Nat, Emily, and yes, even Chloe. I’ll let you guess which one sits closest to Gage.
Then out of the blue—or the gray, as it were—a beautiful blonde plops down beside Chloe as if it were the most normal thing in the world, and I gag on a river of words as soon as I see her.
“Kate?” I can hardly get her name out. Kate Winston. “Oh my goodness, Kate.” I pick up her hand and kiss it again and again. “Oh, sweet Kate.”
No sooner do I get the words out than everyone on the blanket breaks out in laughter.
“What’s so funny?” Logan calls out as he, Drake, and Ellis get a bonfire going. Logan does a double take our way and his eyes nearly fall out of their sockets as he spots her. “Oh, hey Kate.” He winces slightly before getting back to the task at hand.
As it turns out, in just a few weeks’ time, we’ll all go on a ski trip and I’ll accidentally lop her head off. It’s been one of my biggest horrors in life, and for obvious reasons, hers, too.
“Kate.” I pull her hand in close, and she does her best to extract it from my grip.
“Whatever you do, don’t go on that upcoming ski trip.
” I can’t get the words out fast enough.
If I had a nickel for every friend I’ve accidentally beheaded, I’d have one nickel, which is still too many.
Hey, maybe I should stick around in this timeline for this reason alone?
I’ll not only be protecting my children, I’ll be protecting Kate’s primal apex!
“What?” She yanks her hand free, and the bitch squad dissolves in laughter once again—I’m counting Bree in that number for now. “I’m not going on the ski trip,” she says. “I hate skiing. I always stay home.”
“Oh, thank goodness.” I close my eyes and take a deep breath before it hits me that no matter what I do here, I can’t change the past. And for Kate, that’s downright tragic. Because no matter how much she claims to hate skiing, Kate Winston was very much hitting the slopes all those years ago.
Chloe scoffs. “Winston, are you really going to let Messenger boss you around like that? You’re going on that trip, and you’re going to ski the life out of it.”
More like she’s going to ski the life out of herself—or more to the point, I’m going to ski the life out of her—with my actual ski.
Crap.
Kate looks from me to Chloe, then back again, swallowing hard.
“You’re right, Chloe.” She takes a moment to glare at me.
“You wish I weren’t going on that trip.” She makes a face.
“And don’t even think of kissing my hand again.
” She winks over at Gage. “You, however, can kiss any part of me that you want.”
A round of oohs and ahhs goes off, with the exception of Chloe, who looks ready to decapitate Kate right now for daring to flirt so brazenly with her favorite Oliver.
Oh, for the love of all things that make Chloe Bishop homicidal.
It’s a wonder why I ever put up with the she-devil. It was her I should have decapitated.
Maybe I will this go-around—you know, just for funsies—but first, I need to figure out how to save Kate from a fate I’m apparently destined to deliver.
Because watching Kate laugh and flirt, so beautifully alive, I realize with bone-deep terror that some tragedies might be written in stone—even when you know exactly how to prevent them. And that, in and of itself, is a tragedy.