The night sucked.
Cold sheets.
No sleep.
Just me and my traitor brain spinning in circles.
In the morning, I saw his shoes by the door.
That meant he'd come back sometime in the dead of night but was now gone again.
I couldn't pretend I wasn't disappointed.
But work slammed into me, and I buried myself in it.
I spent the next few days camped out at Moss & Flame, working ten-hour shifts, hunched over gem settings and wax casts.
I came home too wrecked to care about anything, let alone our 'rehearsal.'
Ashton was apparently busy too.
No sign of him for days.
Not even a shadow in the hallway.
Our whole flirt-to-convince-the-family thing?
Dead in the water.
Which—fine by me.
Sort of.
Ashton was hot, yeah, but cuddling with someone that good-
