I stared at my mother, who even now was trying to wave the rips in my direction.
I took Dune’s hand and closed the rip world.
I left my mother behind.
My hair was still wet from the shower when I climbed into his lap, which was my new favorite place. If we had to be vertical. “She’ll get out. She’s not activated. She doesn’t have enough strength to sustain them.”
He held me close, and his big hand ran slow circles over my back. “Are you okay?”
“At least I know the truth now.”
“Do you want to talk about it?” he asked.
I wanted to call my dad, see if he’d known the truth, any part of it. “Not right now. Right now let’s talk about how you got this scar.” I smoothed my finger over his eyebrow.
“I fell off the kitchen counter when I was three.”
“Why were you on the kitchen counter?”
“I was trying to get glue off the top of the fridge so I could attach my Matchbox cars to the coffee table.”
“I bet you were a mess of a toddler.” And got away with everything. No mother would’ve been able to resist those eyes. “Do you have siblings?”
“Three. Two of them own a kick-ass resort on the Kona coast. Obviously, I’ve never been to visit. The other is in med school at USC.”
“You’re the baby?”
“Yep.”
I tickled him, hoping he’d tickle back, because that got his hands near the places I wanted them. When he didn’t, I kissed him and slid my hands up the back of his shirt.
“Hallie. We need to talk about today. I don’t want you to swallow the truth. It’ll burn a hole through you.”
“Why can’t we act like everything is normal?” I removed my hands, put them in my lap. “Just for today?”
“Don’t think I wouldn’t rather be kissing you.” He laid one on me that made my toes curl for posterity. “Because I would. But I’d also like to be kissing you next week and next month and next year. If we can’t figure this out, that won’t—”
“Next year.” I leaned back to look at him. “You want to be kissing me next year?”
“Yes.” Straight and true. “But you have to be here.”
“You think there’s a chance I won’t be?”
When he didn’t answer, I pushed away from him to go to the window. To calm my breathing. So I didn’t have to see the truth on his face.
“You aren’t the only one who loses if this situation goes wrong,” he said. “I didn’t see you coming, and then you were there, and now … you’re everywhere.”
“I never wanted to belong to someone.” After Benny, I never wanted to risk loss like that again.
“You belong to yourself, Hal. More than anyone I’ve ever known.”
“But I—I need you.”
“You don’t think I need you?” he asked.
I turned around to face him.
“I didn’t come to New Orleans looking for this. I was trying to do a job, to carry my weight for the Hourglass. But now I’ve come to believe that my place is with you.”
“Dune—”
“I’m going to be with you until we fix this. And I want to be with you after that.” His shoulders raised and lowered. “All I need to know is what you want, and you don’t have to tell me now, okay?”
“I already know,” I said, crossing the room to him. “It’s you.”
Decorative pillows littered Hallie’s bedroom floor the way confetti littered the city at Mardi Gras. At least the Mardi Gras I’d seen.
“How long do you think we can hold Mom off once she gets out of the rip?” Hallie tucked her head in the crook of my shoulder.
Her hair was a mess again, and I realized how much I loved her like that. Breathless and ravished. Thanks to me.
“Since I’m assuming that at least half your determination comes from your mom, I don’t expect her to take too long.” I kissed her soundly and started picking up the cushions, tossing them to her one by one. “Hopefully, she thinks it’s just you and me without backup. We need an advantage.”
“I’m not sure she’s anticipating a team of X-Men, but who knows?” She caught a pillow right in front of her face, and then peeked out from behind it, grinning. “Is Liam Ballard bald?”
“No, actually, but he’s still more Professor X than Magneto.”
“Speaking of hair,” she said, “yours is a mess.”
I looked in the mirror. I had enough hair for it to be a mess. “What day is it?”
“December tenth.”
Christmas was a couple of weeks away. I felt like I’d known Hallie for years, but it wasn’t enough. She stepped up beside me, and we looked at our side-by-side reflection. My skin was tan, hers was pale. We both had light eyes and dark hair, but her features were delicate. Mine were big and broad.
“I like the way we look,” she said, meeting my eyes.
“I concur.”
“I’ve been waiting to give you my Christmas wish list, and I think this is the perfect time.”
“Because we have the opportunity to shop right now?” I faced her, smoothed her messy hair. “Kidding. Spring it on me.”
“Spend Christmas here. With me. That’s all. That’s the only thing I want.”
The statement was reminiscent of what she’d said to me on the stairs the day she’d threatened to get me fired. Forever ago. “I thought the only thing you wanted was to know my name.”
The kiss she gave me was sweet. “I knew you’d catch that.”
A knock interrupted the moment. Hallie opened the door to Michael and Em. They both looked serious.
“Any word on Teague?” Michael asked. His eyes widened, like he was trying to communicate something silently.
“Not yet,” Hallie said, looking back and forth between us, pulling her hair into a knot on top of her head.
“Hallie, can I borrow you for a second?” Emerson asked. “I wanted … I needed you to …”
“Talk to me alone so that Michael will stop doing the eyebrow-raise thing, and he and Dune can have a private conversation?” Hallie asked.
Em let out a sigh. “Thank you.”
Grinning, Hallie stood on her tiptoes to kiss me. I gave her one last squeeze. Michael followed me downstairs to the living room.
“Sit.” I gestured toward the couch.
He rubbed his hand over his face. “I’ve been reading through the Infinityglass research, the part you told me to focus on. I talked to Liam, too. This isn’t a sit-down conversation.”
I disagreed. Michael was pacing, and it made my stomach threaten an out-of-body experience. I sat.
“If you follow it to its logical conclusion, transmutation is about cell regeneration. Regeneration, making things new. Renewal. Fixing what’s broken.”
“I understand the definition. Hallie does, too.”
Being a smart-ass wasn’t in my wheelhouse, so Michael let the comment go. “Regeneration, especially if it happens that fast, could heal the continuum.”
“What are you saying?” I asked.
“I believe Hallie could heal the continuum.”
