Finally, a small break. Not enough to give him hope.
He glanced past her, watching a few crows settle on the electrical lines beyond her window. Crows were clever as hell, and they always seemed to know when something terrible was about to happen. How fitting.
Eli made himself say, “Then you understand to some degree. I looked up to you in grade school, that’s it. And at one point, I was curious how you were doing. I thought about contacting you, but I was afraid you’d think it was weird.”
She nodded sharply. “It would’ve been, yeah. Actually, I think I do remember now. Big kid, name was… Nope, it’s not coming to me.”
If anything, Eli wished he could forget, but his memory was uncomfortably precise on certain details. “Roddy Frierson. He made elementary school a living hell for me until you intervened. You threatened to tell his grandma.”
Iris snapped her fingers, seeming pleased over retrieving the recollection. “Yeah! He cried. I’d forgotten about that until now.” Her sudden smile faded. “You fixate, huh? That wasn’t a big deal to me back then. Shouldn’t have been to you either.”
“You don’t get to decide that.”
Her lip curled. “Whatever. So I was your childhood hero and you looked me up later on socials. That’s how you recognized me in the café. Did you go there intending to meet me?” Her expression gave nothing away now, but her gaze was cold and wary, as if she was already braced for the worst.
“No!” Maybe if he spoke quickly enough, she’d believe him. “I was in town working on Gamma’s house before you arrived. Meeting you was a total coincidence. I went over, just intending to introduce myself and thank you. That’s it! If you recall, you assumed I wanted to rent a room, so I was extremely confused, and then…”
“And then?”
Yeah, she won’t like this. But it’s true.
“When I understood your financial situation, I wanted to help.”
“Which is why you rented my most expensive room. Because you pitied me. When you didn’t even need a place to stay. Well, fuck you, Eli. You could’ve left St. Claire weeks ago there’s nothing to hold you here.”
You’re here, he wanted to say. But she wouldn’t believe any declarations at this stage, so he didn’t speak the words. Better to keep them than hear her call him a liar again. That fucking stung, even if she had it right.
“I just wanted to repay you,” he said.
“Let’s say that’s true… It’s still important to get someone’s consent. I never authorized you to act as my agent with the coven. I’m not okay with being sugar babied. Maybe you felt sorry for me this whole time, but I’m not interested in that either.”
He stepped toward her, and she moved back. Message received. We’re not people who touch anymore. Fuck, that hurts. “You can’t turn away their help because of me.”
“I already have. This is my issue to solve. I’ll accept the bracelet and your thanks, nothing more. Any debt between us is more than repaid. You gave me a lot of emotional support these past months, and that’s all I wanted from you. Sally said you had your reasons, but I frankly don’t care. Lies are lies.”
“So we’re done?” he asked, not wanting the answer but needing it.
Her gray eyes were like a heavy bank of storm clouds. “I’m sure you foresaw that. If you move out, we’re one step closer to solving the issue.”
“What can I do?” he whispered. “How can I make it up to you?”
Iris replied with brutal honesty. “You can’t. I fell in love with someone else, the person you were pretending to be. There’s only broken trust now. The real you? I don’t know that guy, and I don’t belong with him either.”
You do. You know everything about me that matters. But the words couldn’t fit past the tightness of his throat.
She went on, relentless, severing their ties with words that wounded him surgically, each syllable a fresh slice. “I hope you’ll figure out a plausible excuse for everyone else. I don’t want them hurt.”
He swallowed hard, past the ache that made him want to dive into hawk form and scream to the skies. Because of his own fuckery, he was losing the only home he’d known since his parents died and he realized that Gamma had put her life on hold to raise him. “I’ll take care of it,” he rasped.
It took all his fortitude not to cry in front of her; there was no point since he’d done this to himself, and he understood that well enough.
Everything ends. Always.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
The rest of the day, Iris didn’t go downstairs except to use the bathroom.
Somebody, probably Sally, left food outside her door, and apparently, she told their other housemates that Iris had caught a bug. A devastating, heart-destroying bacteria, yep. And while she was wallowing, Eli vanished as quietly as he’d come.
Gone, just like she’d asked. Ordered? Yeah, more like ordered.
Now she had no clue how to pass this inspection, but she had to start somewhere. The next day, she stumbled out of her sad lady lair and found boxes of alarms, detectors, and fire extinguishers piled up at the foot of the attic steps. Eli must have bought them before taking off, before the breakup.
Is that even the right word?
She couldn’t obsess, not now. Gathering her resolve as she gathered the packages, she hauled them to Henry Dale, who was sipping a cup of coffee at the kitchen table. “You said you could install these?”
“I’ll take care of it.” The old man scrutinized her from head to toe. “Did you know that Eli left? He said he had to see his grandmother—that it was urgent and he didn’t know when he’d be back.”
She tried to keep her expression neutral. “He told me yesterday. In other news, I can’t afford the major cost associated with such a big spell. And I guess the coven isn’t enthusiastic about a payment plan. We’re back to square one.”
The older man patted her shoulder with a deadpan expression. “If all else fails, I’ll marry you. But we’re not sharing a room or a bed.”
Startled to her soul, Iris cracked up laughing. “You’ve made my day, seriously.”
“I live to entertain,” he said in that same droll tone.
Though she still hurt, at least she wasn’t alone. Eli might be. She recalled what he’d said about wanting to live as a hawk—was any of that even true? Still, part of her hoped that Eli had, indeed, gone to seek comfort with his grandma. No, I won’t waste my mental energy on him. Who is he again?
Iris tuned back in to find Henry Dale was in the middle of an update. “I’m working on the gingerbread issue, but I’ll have to pause to install the alarms. Just so you know.”
“I appreciate everything you do,” she said.
“What about me?” Rowan asked.
“I appreciate you as well,” Iris said.
“Me too,” Henry Dale added.
Rowan had a sketch pad tucked under their arm, and they seemed a bit subdued, likely because of Eli’s sudden departure. But they’d get used to the new dynamic soon enough; everyone would. And Iris would act like she was fine until her heart stopped feeling like somebody had yanked it from her chest and stepped on it.