“And just what is Ava seeing fit to trust you with?” I ask. “Other than helping out at the store, I mean?”

Honor stands, her attention momentarily claimed by the bell clanging hard against the door, announcing a new arrival, as she says, “For one thing, she’s seen fit to have me track down some rare herbs for Damen. Something to do with some antidote he’s making?”

She lifts her brow, directs a wave to the browsing customer, then returns to me. “And, as it just so happens, it arrived about an hour ago.

Got it right here.” She reaches under the counter, grabs a tiny plain-wrapped package, and slaps it down in front of her. “I was gonna call him to come pick it up, but now that you’re here, well, maybe you should take it to him? I’m guessing it’s been a while since you’ve last seen him, no?”

I stare at the package, my heart hammering, my throat constricting, aware of her gaze weighing on me.

“What day is it?” I ask.

She shoots me a funny look. “Sunday, why?”

“Sunday…”

“Sunday, May twenty-fourth.” She slinks around the counter and makes for her customer, as I grab the package, shove it deep inside my front pocket, and make my way out the door.

Chapter thirty-five

I don’t go to Damen’s.

I plan to, I have every intention to, but there’s something else I need to do first. So after manifesting a car, I head straight for Jude’s.

Wanting to catch him before he leaves for the store, and nearly crashing right into him when he backs his Jeep out of his drive just as I’m pulling in.

“Ever?” He peers at me from his sideview mirror as his car jumps to a halt and he springs from his seat.

I stare. I can’t help it. He looks so completely different from the last time I saw him.

His head is shaved.

And without his trademark tangle of long golden/bronze dreadlocks he’s barely recognizable—or at least until his eyes find mine anyway. That brilliant aqua-green gaze is all too familiar, not to mention the wave of cool, calm energy that thrums over me, through me, all around me, in the same way it has for the last several centuries.

He runs a self-conscious hand over his newly shorn head, his tropical gaze meeting mine when he says, “Figured it was time for a change, but from the look on your face I’m thinking I should start growing it again.”

I slip out of my car, trying my best to not overdo it with the staring. Even though he looks great, in fact, better than great, it’s still a pretty big visual adjustment to make.

“Nah.” I smile brightly and shake my head. “Keep it. I mean, what’s the point of going back, when you can go forward instead?”

His eyes graze over me, allowing the words to hang between us until he breaks the silence and says, “You look like you’ve been through the wringer.” He motions toward the sorry state of my clothes. “But you made it, and that’s what matters. It’s good to see you, Ever.” And I can tell by the tone of his voice and the glint in his eye that for the first time in a long time he actually means it. My presence no longer elicits that same brand of longing it used to.

“And you.” I chase the words with another smile, wanting him to know that I mean it too.

We stand before each other, allowing the silence to build. But it’s not the awkward kind of silence, it’s the kind shared by two people who’ve experienced something so extraordinary there’s just no way to put it into words.

“When’d you get back?” I ask, wondering if he was gone a long time too.

He looks at me, squints, and says, “Long time ago. Way before you. I thought about going after you, trying to find you, but Lotus warned me against it, warned me to not get involved.” Jude jangles his keys, motions toward his front door. “Do you want to go inside?”

I press my lips together, thinking about inside. The kitchen where I once did his dishes, the old chair where I used to sit, the antique door he uses as a coffee table, the brown corduroy couch where he confessed his feelings for me…

“No, I—” I look at him, swallow hard, and start again. “I just wanted to make sure you made it back from Summerland. Just wanted to make sure you got through it okay, and…” I lift my shoulders, look all around, seeing the peonies back in bloom—big, vibrantly colored puffballs of purple and pink sprouting from the top of sturdy green stems. “And, it seems you did, so…”

But he won’t let me off that easily. He won’t allow me to just brush it away. “Should we talk about it?” he asks, his gaze telling me he’s more than willing to do so if I want.

And while we most certainly could, I can’t help but think: What would be the point?

I mean, what’s there left to talk about, really? We know everything now. We relived the actual events for ourselves. So what’s the point in rehashing what we already know?

I shake my head and direct my gaze to our feet—he in his usual brown rubber flip-flops, me in my crusty, dirty hiking boots. Then I lift my head and say, “That would just end up being redundant now, wouldn’t it?”

He lifts his shoulders, keeps his gaze on me.

“Though, it must be a relief to know you didn’t really love me and lose me all those years, right?”

He tilts his head, confused by my statement.

“What I mean is, or at least from what I can tell after stringing it all together, it’s pretty clear you were just trying to keep me and Damen apart so he wouldn’t make me immortal. You know, so he wouldn’t succeed at what he’d failed to do that first life of ours when you were Heath, he was Alrik, and I was Adelina.”