Looking back on it now, it was easy to see that he had perhaps not handled that conversation as well as he could have, but he’d thought she’d understand. She was a witch, too, after all; she knew all about betrothals.
As his jeans hitting him in the head had swiftly taught him, Vivienne did not in fact know all about betrothals, and that whole magical summer had come to a literally screaming halt.
Until now.
“I’m here for the ley lines,” he finally said, sitting up and shaking the twigs out of his hair.
“I know that,” she replied, crossing her arms over her chest. “Cutting it kind of close, aren’t you? Only showing up the night before Founder’s Day?”
“I didn’t want to spend much time here,” he said, then gave her a sardonic grin. “Can’t imagine why, given the warm welcome and all.”
Rolling her eyes, Vivienne turned to head back up the hill. “Okay, well, I’d say I was sorry about nearly killing you, but we both know that’s a lie, so I’ll leave you to find your own way home.”
“Or,” Rhys offered, coming to his feet, “you could be the absolute darling I know you are and give me a ride?”
She spun around, that light still bobbing like a demented firefly. “And why would I do that?”
“Well,” Rhys said, lifting a finger, “for one, I am in town for altruistic purposes that benefit you and your family. Two”—another finger—“when you were on top of me, I did not make a single pervy reference to other times we’d found ourselves in that position.”
“Except that you’re doing that now, but continue.”
“And three . . .” Rhys lifted the last finger, then looked down at his hand and frowned. “Actually, number three was going to be a pervy reference to our past, so probably best you leave me here to die.”
To his surprise, the corner of her mouth ticked up a little at that.
Not quite a smile, certainly nothing as robust as a laugh, but it was something. She had liked him once, after all. Quite a lot, really.
And he’d liked her, too. That had been the worst part of it all when it ended. Rhys had never met anyone he liked just as much as he lusted for, and it had made missing her ten times worse.
Even now, battered and bruised and possibly standing in squirrel shit, he was . . . happy. Glad to see her, brush with vehicular homicide aside.
Maybe coming back wouldn’t be so bad after all,
And then she turned away with a “Sounds good!”
The light above her blinked out and Rhys stood, dumbfounded, as she marched up the hill, never once looking back at him.
He was still standing there when he heard her car door open and close, the engine start, and the tires crunch down the dirt road.
In the aftermath, the only sounds were the wind picking up yet again and the faint skittering of some nocturnal animal.
“Fair play, I suppose,” Rhys said to the darkness. “Fair play.”
Sighing, he looked back up the hill and picked up his bag from where it had landed, and slinging it over his shoulder, lifted his free hand to summon up his own light.
His fingers sparked, and a bolt of flame suddenly shot out, hitting the nearest tree limb and sending it crashing to earth with a crack and a smell suspiciously like burned hair.
“Right,” Rhys said, stomping on the smoldering leaves and actually grateful that he could feel the first fat droplets of rain start to fall.
The sooner he was out of Graves Glen, the better.
Chapter 6
“So you just left him there.”