“Nope. Most are pretty mind-numbing.” He placed his glass down. “Unlike you, I acknowledge the inherent flaws in things I like.”

Now I was rolling my eyes. “And unlike you, I have good taste.”

Zayne smiled at me, and my stupid breath caught as his gaze snared mine. My chest felt as full as my stomach as we stared at each other over the flickering candle. He bit down on his lower lip, dragging his teeth over the flesh, and my toes curled inside my boots.

I’m not trying to make it easy.

Those were his words—words that couldn’t mean what I thought they did—but the longer he held my stare, the more uncertain I became. The air was chilly in here, but my skin felt too warm. My pulse was staccato, and while there was a small part of me that felt silly, like we were playing pretend at being normal for a few hours, I was having the best night I could remember in a long time—and we still had tomorrow. A day of sightseeing and just...hanging out. I was so excited for it that I wanted to fast-forward time as well as press Pause to actually savor the anticipation. Sort of like how I always enjoyed Christmas Eve over Christmas. It was the buildup, the excitement and wonder of what was to come.

A feminine throat cleared, and I jerked my gaze from Zayne’s to the source. It was the waitress. What was her name? Daisy? Dolly? Her loose blond hair looked super glossy and bouncy—and quite different from the ponytail she’d been rocking when we first walked in.

Zayne looked up with a smile. “Have we worn out our welcome yet?”

The normal answer should’ve been yes. We’d been here too long and hadn’t ordered dessert. We hadn’t even looked at the dessert menu.

That was, of course, not the answer.

“Of course not, honey.” The woman clasped her hands together, creating a rather deep display of impressive cleavage. “You’re more than welcome to stay as long as you like. I just wanted to make sure there wasn’t anything else you needed.”

“I’m fine.” Zayne looked over at me. “Trin?”

I glanced at my half-filled Coke and shook my head.

“We’re good.” Zayne glanced to where his phone sat on the table. It had been lighting up every so often, and I’d wondered who was texting him. He’d responded once. “Actually, we should get the check.” His gaze found its way back to me. “Unless you want dessert?”

“God.” I laughed. “If I did, the next stop will be Nap Town, population me.”

He gave me a lopsided grin. “Just the check, please.”

As the waitress hurried off, I cocked an eyebrow, and Zayne stared at me like he had no idea why I was looking at him. Could he be that oblivious? “What time is it?”

“Almost nine,” he answered.

“What?” I exclaimed. We hadn’t come straight here from the park; we’d gone back to the apartment, because Zayne had needed to run down to the office manager or something, but we’d been here for almost three hours.

Zayne sat back, lifting his shoulder. “Time doesn’t exist when you’re enjoying yourself.”

That was true.

He gave a curt shake of his head. “You know, I lied to you.”

My brows lifted. “About what?”

“Remember when you asked me if I’d ever wanted to be something other than a Warden?” he asked, and I nodded. “I don’t know why I started thinking about that, but I didn’t tell you the truth. I think I lied because I was caught so off guard by the question.”

I remembered that he’d said no one had asked him that before, and I was guessing that even meant Layla. “What was it?”

Zayne nodded. “When I was a kid, I... I wanted to be a doctor.” He turned his head, and I would’ve sworn on my life that his cheeks were pink. “A trauma doctor.”

“A trauma doctor? Wow.” I couldn’t help myself. “That’s a great profession for egotistical personalities.”

He laughed that laugh of his, making me grin like a fool. “Are you calling me an egomaniac?”

“Never,” I teased. “What made you want to be a doctor?”

“I don’t know. Actually, I do.” He shoved a hand through his hair. “Every Saturday morning, my father used to take me to this ice cream shop in the city. It’s one of those old-style parlors that looks like something out of a different era, and it was a tradition that I ended up carrying on with Layla.”

Expecting to feel a familiar surge of jealousy, I was surprised when all I felt was a twinge of sadness. Not because of Layla. Not because that could’ve—should’ve—been me, but because Misha and I had had our little rituals, too.

“Anyway, one time when I was there with my father, a woman ran in carrying a boy who’d been hit by a car. Blood was everywhere, and nobody moved as the kid’s mother screamed for help. Even Dad had frozen. Can you imagine that? A Warden like him, rendered incapable by an unexpected human accident?”

“No,” I whispered, though I couldn’t imagine what I would have done, either.

“And then this woman stepped out of somewhere in the parlor and just took over. No fear of the blood or that she was going to do something wrong. She knew to keep the boy’s head and neck immobile and was able to keep that kid’s heart beating until paramedics showed up. I was about six or maybe seven, and I was fascinated. I overheard her tell the paramedics she was a doctor before she started talking in medical jargon that sounded like a different language.”

He leaned toward me, pale eyes intense. “I have no idea if that kid survived, but all I could think was how amazing the woman was. I wanted to be that random person in the crowd who could step up and save a life. So, I wanted to be a doctor.”

“Did you ever tell your father that?”

“No.” He laughed under his breath as he reached for his glass but didn’t lift it to his mouth. “There’d be no point. You know that. I was raised and groomed to take... Yeah, well, you know that story. It’s not like he’d have laughed or gotten mad. Knowing him, he would’ve picked up medical textbooks for me to read. But I knew that wasn’t why I was here.”

I nodded slowly, understanding that what he meant by here was not a place so much as a purpose. “You know, you might not have become a doctor, but you are that person.”

His brows knitted in confusion.

“That random person in the crowd who can step in and save someone’s life,” I explained, finding myself leaning toward him. “You’ve done that before. Probably more times than you can count. You’re not a doctor, but you are that person.”

Zayne stared at me for so long that I started to worry I’d said the wrong thing.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

“Always,” he murmured, and then he caught that lower lip of his again. “I just never looked at it that way.”

“Look at me.” I smiled. “Being all useful and stuff, showing you a whole new way of thinking.”

“You’re always helpful.” Thick lashes lifted, and I felt pierced to the core by his stare. “And you’ve already been showing me a new way of thinking.”

I opened my mouth, to say what, I had no idea, but Zayne shifted topics. “Been thinking about our living arrangements these last couple of days,” he said. “We can’t stay there, at least not in that apartment. We need something with two bedrooms, two baths. That’s one of the things I was taking care of today. Met with the property manager to see if they have anything open.”

Looking for a bigger place made sense. Zayne couldn’t keep sleeping on the couch, and while the morning schedule was working, it still was a bit of a pain. But I was weirdly caught off guard, because he hadn’t broached the idea with me.

He ran a finger along the base of the candle. “The rental contracts at the building are month to month, so if we move, we’re not stuck.”

I was nodding, because that also made sense. He and I, as long as I lived and so did he, were a permanent thing. A forever thing. And it was smart and safer for us to live together. That was why Misha and I had lived in the same house back in the Community.

I had no idea why I was acting as if he was speaking a language I didn’t understand.

Giving my head a good shake, I was relieved to find common sense had returned to me. “Is there a place open?”

“There are two, but one needs extensive remodeling, and that concerns me considering the building is new. Who knows what the previous tenant did to the place.”

Immediately my mind went to a murder scene that required biohazard cleanup...which was a sure indication there was something wrong with me. “What about the other place?”

“It’s currently under contingency, but the people haven’t signed the lease yet, so maybe they’ll back out. If they do, it’s ours.”

“Ours?” I let out a nervous laugh. “Then that means I want to help with rent. I have money now.” I paused, still seeing the zeros and not quite believing it. “I need to pay my way.”

“If that’s what you want, that’s what we’ll do.”

I smiled and nodded again, no longer feeling like a total freeloader. But then something else occurred to me, and my smile faded. I thought about what he’d said the night before, about how his apartment was just a place to rest his head. “You’re really not planning to move back in with your clan, ever?”

Zayne shook his head. “No.”

“Is it because of me and the bond?”

“The moment I moved out, I knew I wasn’t coming back. Who I was when I lived there, within those walls, under that roof and with my clan?” he said. “I’m not him anymore, and that has nothing to do with being your Protector.”

I mulled that over. “Because of your father and...and what happened with Layla?”

“Yeah, because of that, but there are also too many things I don’t agree with to be a part of them like I was before. And they know that. Many of them don’t trust me anymore, and obviously, I don’t trust a lot of them, either. Me leaving was the best answer.”