Page 116 of Tangled with the Tight End

I can barely make out Winona on the bed.

“I’m here. Electricity went out.” I take a breath. “That means the elevator’s out.”

“I can’t see anything,” Winona says, grabbing her phone and turning the flashlight on, she waves it around the room and straight into my eyes.

I shield my face from the light and she laughs. “Sorry.”

“You sure about that?” I ask, laughing.

“Yes.” Her laughter fills the muted darkness like a shared secret.

She pivots her flashlight so it’s aimed down toward the floor.

“Want to shine that for me while I gather up candles and a few other things from the laundry room?” I ask her.

“Sure,” she says. “This is kind of fun.”

My smile, the one that belongs to her, rises up from somewhere deep inside me, pushing my cheeks taut and crinkling my eyes.

With her flashlight aimed at the floor in front of me, her gaze isn’t on me. She can’t see the way she turns me inside out. She has no idea that she’s become someone I need to see, need to have near me.

Not yet.

I’ll tell her.

I need her to know. Even if she doesn’t share my feelings.

We gather candles—battery operated, thanks to Patrick insisting they’re fire-safe—and I set them on the kitchen island. Winona carries the rest, setting a few up the edge of the stairs in the hallway, one on the coffee table, and two on the hearth.

I bend to open the fireplace.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Winona asks.

“Lighting a fire.”

“Declan. You need to rest your leg. Let me.”

I want to fight her, but she’s right. So I propel myself to the couch and she pulls out one of the long matches from the copper canister on the mantel.

When the fire is lit, she turns and tells me, “I need to call Cass and tell her I’m safe.”

I nod, watching the flames play across her skin, highlighting her features in gold and amber flickers.

She steps back and dials her sister.

“Cass?” Winona says, holding my gaze while she speaks into the phone.

“Hey, yeah … No. I’m safe. Just staying at Declan's until the rain lets up.”

They talk for a few minutes. Winona doesn’t take her eyes off mine.

When she hangs up, I tell her, “I haven’t lit that fireplace in ages.”

Her answer is quiet, matching the mellow lighting of the candles and the fire. “Well, it’s just getting cool enough to be the season for a fire.”

“I used to put it on, drag a few of those pillows out and lay on the carpet, staring up at the ceiling after a long week.”

I’m letting her in. No one knows what I do when I’m alone here. Not my teammates. Not my brother. Not my parents. But I want her to know.