Page 27 of Wanna Bet?

Her throat tightened. “Yeah?” she asked.

“Yeah.”

Feelings pressed against her ribs, insistent and dangerous. She looked away quickly, focusing on the line of trees ahead.

Don’t fall. Don’t fall. Don’t fall. You know how this ends.

She hated herself for this. Hated that she couldn't be normal and that she had to remind herself that she didn't deserve love, or a partner, or even friendship. Her ex’s laugh echoed again in memory, followed by the image of the text she’d found, the apology that hadn’t really been an apology at all.

Myah inhaled slowly. She wasn’t doing that again. She wasn’t giving someone the power to wreck her, not even Jace, especially not Jace.

She shoved her hands into her pockets and tilted her chin up, letting her expression shift back into something lighter and safer and sharper.

“Well,” she said, “don’t get used to it. I’m very hard to book. My schedule is full of important things like ignoring texts and eating snacks at two in the morning.”

He smiled faintly. “I’ll consider myself lucky then.”

Her heart fluttered traitorously and she tried her hardest to ignore it.

They watched the ducks a bit longer before deciding to start the walk towards her place. Jace mentioned needing to close later at the record store and Myah was basically searching for a way out at this point. They kept walking side by side, close enough that she could feel his warmth without touching him, and even though she told herself she wasn’t falling, wasn’t feeling, wasn’t already halfway gone–she stayed just a little closer to him than she needed to.

By the time they reached her street, the world had softened into that quiet, suspended kind of evening that only seemed to exist in the fragile space between sunset and nightfall. The sky stretched overhead in layered shades of violet and gold. Thin clouds streaked like brushstrokes across fading light, while porch lamps flickered on one at a time along the block as if the neighborhood were exhaling after a long day. Gravel crunched beneath their shoes as they slowed near the narrow path leading to her building, both of them aware of the moment for what it was without having to say it aloud: this was where they were supposed to part ways.

Myah slipped her hands into her back pockets, more to keep them busy than out of habit, because energy hummed restlessly beneath her skin in a way that made stillness feel impossible. The high hadn’t dulled her senses; if anything, it had sharpened them. Smoothing out the noise in her head while heightening everything else until the air felt thicker, warmer, charged with something she definitely didn't want to label.

“Well,” she said, rocking once on her heels as she nodded toward the building behind her. “This is me.”

Jace nodded in acknowledgment, but he didn’t move to step back or turn away. Instead, he remained exactly where he was. Close enough that she could feel the quiet heat radiating from him through the small space between their bodies. Close enough that she could make out the tiny details she’d spent the entire afternoon pretending not to notice–the faint shadow along his jaw, the soft shape of his mouth, the way his lashes lowered when he blinked slowly, like he was thinking too hard about something he hadn’t said yet.

He should say goodnight. She should say goodnight. Neither of them did.

The silence that settled between them wasn’t empty; it was dense, electric, filled with the kind of tension that didn’t need words to announce itself. It pressed softly against her skin, humming low beneath her ribs, until she became aware of her own heartbeat thudding steadily in her throat.

“Thanks,” he said after a moment, his voice quiet and roughened just slightly around the edges. “For today.”

The sound of it slid down her spine like warmth poured slowly from a glass.

“For the weed,” she asked, tilting her head, “or for my sparkling personality?”

“For asking me to come.”

There was no joke in his tone, no deflection, no protective humor layered over the words to soften them. It was simple honesty, offered plainly, and the sincerity of it landed square in her chest with enough force to make her breath catch for half a second.

“You’re welcome,” she replied, softer now, the teasing edge fading without her permission.

He looked at her then in a way that made her pulse pick up. Not glancing or scanning, but looking steady and intent as if he were committing something about her to memory. Not her clothes. Not her hair. Her.

The realization spread through her slowly, like heat seeping into cold hands. Her gaze dropped before she could stop it, drawn to his mouth as if something inside her had decided that was where her attention belonged. When she lifted her eyes again, his pupils were blown wide, dark against the fading light.

The shift between them was immediate and unmistakable. Heavy. Magnetic. Unavoidable.

“What?” she asked softly, though she already knew.

“Nothing,” he answered, but he didn’t look away.

Her heart began to pound harder, each beat pressing against her ribs like it wanted out. She could feel it everywhere at once–in her throat, in her wrists, low in her stomach–the rhythm steady and insistent, syncing with the charged quiet wrapped around them.

The high didn’t make her reckless so much as it made her honest, stripping away the extra layers she usually hid behind until what remained felt simpler, clearer, harder to ignore.