Page 96 of Misadventures with a Time Traveler

And I ignored his sacrifice. Chose to ignore it. Threw his gift back in his face, so many times. The treasure I see, embedded in his amber-diamond stare, has been squandered by my own fears, doubts, angers, and insecurities.

My inability to accept the unreal. To grasp the ungraspable. To see my fear and move past it.

To admit that I’ve fallen in love with him.

Too late.

I’m too damn late…

“Max! Max, please!”

But his life force continues to drain. I don’t just see it happening before my eyes, as his body continues to vanish. I feel it too. Feel him disappearing like my tears on the air, which also keep falling like ashes. I feel it like the huge half of my heart that he’s taking with him.

That time is ripping from me.

Just like it’s stealing him.

“No! Nooo!”

His eyes roll back in his head.

“Alessssss…andra…” he repeats, though the word is barely a breath anymore.

“No!” I scream it now. Pummel his chest with the sobbing sequences of it, hating how I can feel every labored, desperate breath limping through his lungs. “Stop screwing with me, you asshole! Don’t do this to me!”

He curls his hand down, brushing feeble fingertips across my soaked cheek. “I…love you.”

“And I love you too, goddamnit. Do you hear me, Maximillian George Jean Valence De Leon? I fucking love you, so stop this bullshit and come back to me!”

I’m nothing but grief now. And humiliation. And desperation. And fury. And loss. And draped across the man who has made me feel more whole and alive and loved than anyone in this time or any other. My heart roars with loss. My mind rages with disbelief.

Which is probably why I don’t hear everyone’s stunned gasps at first. Or even the awed cheers and then the rise of applause.

What the hell are they…

His hand, sprawling against the back of my head, is the beginning of a damn good answer to that. So is the resurgence of his torso beneath my cheek. And then the sleek striations of muscle that lead toward other…surging things.

Thank God for miracles.

A miracle.

Yeah. That’s exactly what I mean this time.

Exactly what I choose to believe, working my way back up the solid sinew of this man’s body until our lips are sealed and our tongues are twirled in what everyone in the room concludes is a grand finale to this newest PR stunt in the “Allie and Max Show.”

And maybe I’ll just let them be right about that.

Because the Allie and Max Hour does have a cool ring to it…

A lot of minutes later—but not nearly long enough—I reluctantly slide my mouth away from his. But only far enough to ensure he’s still all here. That he’s still the miracle that isn’t going away.

Once I establish every flawless inch of the man is still in place, I finally allow him to roll up into a kneel. I do the same, butting my knees against his, mirroring the double-handed hold he has on my face, before whispering, “I do, you know.”

He ticks up one side of his mouth. “You do…what?”

“Love you.”

“Oh. Well…that.”