But the universe didn’t care about that. Later that day, while I took the long way around on my way to the front stage and the first pub sing of the year, I ran almost smack into Daniel, coming from the opposite direction, away from pub sing.

For a couple heartbeats we just stared at each other, a little startled. “Sorry . . .” I started to say.

“No, I’m sorry,” he said. “I know you like pub sing, so I was . . .” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder, where the banners at the front gate were visible.

“You were avoiding pub sing.” I nodded. “Avoiding me.”

“Not avoiding. Giving you space.” He shoved his hands in the front pockets of his jeans, his shoulders hunched as though trying to make himself smaller, to take up less of said space. “Sorry,” he said again.

I wanted to sigh a huge sigh, but I was still strapped into a corset, and this time of year sighs were something that happened after hours. Was this how all this was going to go? I couldn’t do four weeks of the both of us skulking around, hoping to avoid each other.

“C’mere.” I hooked a hand around Daniel’s arm and pulled him back the way I’d come, down the lane and against the flow of traffic. There weren’t any more shows happening on this side of Faire, and the day was almost over, so there was only a trickle of patrons around us.

He followed me without complaint, and I ducked into an almost-alcove made up of a small grouping of young trees. He took a deep breath when I turned to face him. “Listen . . .”

But I wasn’t going to let him speak. It was my turn. “No, you listen.” I tightened my grip on his arm, and he made no attempt to pull free. He raised his eyebrows in a question, and I had trouble forming words. How dare he look so damned sincere, after everything I’d learned about him. How dare his eyes look so welcoming. How dare I want to forgive absolutely everything and start over again with him.

“Tell me something,” I finally said, stepping closer to him, as though I wanted to tell him a secret. Screw personal space. It didn’t apply right now.

“Anything.” He shifted his weight forward, bringing himself even closer. This close, I could see a sprinkling of freckles across his nose, and I idly hoped that he wore enough sunscreen.

But I forced myself back on topic. “Why did you do it? Why did you lie about who you were?”

He seemed to expect this question. “You were happy,” he said simply. “And I wanted you to stay that way.” He shrugged, his expression helpless. “I knew you didn’t want me, not really, but if I could keep talking to you and keep you happy . . .” He trailed off with another shrug.

Damn. That was a pretty good answer. I forced my brain back on task. “Was it . . .” I cleared my throat. It was hard to speak with his eyes looking all green at me like that. “Was that the only lie? Or was it all . . . ?” I couldn’t finish that sentence. The thought of everything he said being fake was too much to contemplate. I tried one more time. “Was any of it real? The words, I mean. Did Dex tell you to say those things, or . . . ?”

“No.” His eyes sharpened, chips of glass instead of green fire. “Dex had nothing to do with anything I ever wrote to you. I . . . Stacey . . .”

“Anastasia,” I corrected him. A smile danced around the corners of his mouth.

“Anastasia.” My full name was a soft breath, and utterly delicious when he said it out loud. “Everything I said . . . every email, every text. Those were all me. I promise. I know it was . . .” He swallowed, and I tried to not watch the movement of his throat with any interest. “I know it was a pretty big lie, but I swear it was the only one.”

“Promise?” I asked, and he nodded. “No more lies?” I searched his eyes and saw nothing but honesty in them.

“No more lies,” he echoed. “I promise. If I could take it all back, I would, believe me. I’d figure out a way to do it right instead.”

“No,” I said. Despite the past few days, I wouldn’t want to take back our words. The way he’d made me feel. That terrible day he’d gotten me through.

Besides, when I’d reminded him that my name was Anastasia, I’d already decided to forgive him, hadn’t I?

So after another search of his eyes, I nodded slowly. “Okay.” My breath escaped my body with that one word, and with it went the tension, the doubt I’d been feeling.

“Okay . . . okay, what?” His expression was guarded, as if he didn’t dare to hope.

“Maybe we could . . . I don’t know. Start over or something?”

“Yeah?” His eyebrows shot up and a genuine smile blossomed across his face, crinkling the edges of his eyes. “I think I’d like that.”

“Me too.” My breath stalled in my lungs in a way that had nothing to do with my corset as his hand came up to touch the side of my face, tracing my cheekbone with his fingertips. His touch felt better than anything I could have imagined. I reached up to lay a hand on his shoulder, warm under his T-shirt. He caught his breath, and his hand curled under my chin, tipping my face up to his.

“Anastasia.” His voice was hushed, my name reverent. “I’d really, really like to kiss you. Would that . . .” He swallowed hard and bent down a fraction. “Would that be . . .”

“Okay.” I rose slowly up onto my toes, smiling.

“Okay.” The word was said against my mouth as his lips finally met mine: a kiss that was months in the making.

His kiss was a soft brush of lips and a rough scratch of stubble, almost over before it began, and I stretched up farther on my toes to keep his mouth right there where I wanted it.

Daniel made it clear from the start that he was nothing like Dex. If Dex had kissed me out in the open at Faire like that . . . well, he never would have kissed me in public like that, first of all. The closest we’d ever come to any kind of PDA was outside the door of his hotel room, and we were in his room and up against the wall within thirty seconds. Everything with him had been down and dirty and in the dark, and there was a part of me back then that had really responded to that.

But Daniel was different. He wasn’t down and dirty. His kisses were sweet, closed-mouthed, and achingly conscious of the fact that we were in public. If someone had walked by or thrown us a second glance, he would have stepped away from me immediately. But no one did, and after a few moments of soft, exploratory kisses that made my toes curl in my boots, he pulled away, just far enough to brush my cheek with his mouth.

“Why don’t you come by tonight, after you’re done here?”

“Oh.” My heart sank, and in an instant the promise in those kisses melted away like a sugar cube in the rain. Of course. There was the down and dirty. He knew the arrangement I’d had with Dex for the past couple summers, and now he was looking for his turn. I didn’t like the way that made me feel. Cheap. Like I was being passed around from one cousin to the other. No, I didn’t like that at all.

It must have shown on my face, because Daniel’s eyes went wide and he looked chastened. “Stacey.” He moved toward me again, his hand cupping my elbow. It was a comforting touch, though I didn’t want it to be. I should have wanted to brush him away, not lean into him. “I’m not my cousin.” He caught my chin again and ducked down, catching my eyes with his. “Look at me. I need you to understand that.”

“I do,” I said, but I didn’t sound convincing even to myself.

“No,” he said, “you don’t. But you will. Please, come over tonight. Room 212. Okay?”

I didn’t want to be a cheap hookup to Daniel. But he’d just given me the sweetest kisses of my life, which deserved to be taken into account. Which was why I ultimately nodded. “Room 212. Okay.”

Fourteen

I almost talked myself out of it.

I went home after Faire and took a long, hot shower. I dried my hair and snuggled with Benedick for a few minutes. I put on a cute dress. I took it off and pulled on yoga pants and a T-shirt. I put on makeup. I took it off. I was stalling.

My phone remained silent, something I wasn’t used to these days. I’d grown used to those nightly check-ins from Dex . . . no, from Daniel. When I’d gotten home from the bar last night I’d changed Dex’s name in my phone to Daniel’s, but I was still working on reordering my thinking when it came to this whole mess. But he didn’t send any texts. He didn’t ask if I was coming or not. He was giving me space, as he’d said this afternoon.

But I wasn’t sure if I wanted that space. I wasn’t sure what I wanted next with him. As I checked my phone for the fourth time since I’d gotten home, I realized that I missed him. I wanted to hear from him. And he was waiting, more patiently than I could have ever expected, for me to take what we’d had all these months off-line and into real life.

I kissed Benedick on the top of his head, plopped him on the couch, and grabbed my keys. I’d stalled long enough.

It didn’t take long to drive to the hotel, and before I could think too hard about it I was knocking on the door of his room. The relieved, almost overjoyed look on Daniel’s face when he opened the door told me that I’d made the right decision. He wasn’t looking for a hookup. He was looking for me.