Page 116 of The Unfinished Line

“The last time you asked me that, I came home covered in mud and bug bites and bruises.” But I was out of the car before she’d even opened her door. The idea of having a little time together before we got to her mother’s house was intensely inviting.

She came around the car, helping me into my jacket. “Luck is in your favor.” Her lips were against my ear, raising a row of goosebumps along the nape of my neck. “Not many bugs in winter in Wales.” But just as abruptly, she stepped away, turningto stroll down the gravel road until she found a weak wire in the livestock fence loose enough to pry apart, allowing us to slip through.

What were the charges for trespassing in Wales, I wanted to know.

Execution without trial, she said.

I asked her if they would bury us together like the Lovers of Valdaro, united until the end of time.

She told me she thought she could have it arranged.

Then it was definitely worth the risk, I said, stepping onto the other side.

I followed her down an overgrown wildlife path strewn with cow patties and seashells until we reached the knolls of sand built up along the shale-covered shore. The breeze had intensified over the ocean, beginning to blow off the marine layer, revealing white-capped waters that lapped onto the sandbar.

Dillon stopped, taking a moment to survey the view, and then dropped into the willowy reed growing atop the dunes. I took a seat beside her, glad to find the ground dry, and surprised to discover the woven stalks of grass provided a welcome shelter from the wind.

“My mam can come across as standoffish,” she said without preface, evidently picking up in the middle of a conversation she’d been holding in her head. “It’s just her nature, as a solicitor. She can seem brittle. But I promise, beneath her formal English exterior, she’s kind-natured at heart. She’ll like you.” Still not looking at me, she drew her knees to her chin. “She’s a terrible cook. Every Christmas she insists on baking, and promptly burns every item she shoves in the oven to a char. My dad always claimed it was the driving force that made him fall in love with her—her dreadful kitchen talents. He said he worried, if left to her own devices, she’d have withered away and died.”Her laugh was hapless. “It’s one of the reasons Seren moved back home. To uphold Dad’s promise to keep her fed.”

Continuing to stare through the curtain of seagrass, Dillon absently ran her palm across the feathery seed blooms listing atop the reeds. “They both love Christmas carols, my mam and Seren. My sister will sit at the piano and play the same ones over and over again. Don’t let on that you can sing or they’ll try and cajole you to join them.”

“And what if I want to sing with them?” I challenged pertly, tapping one of her tennis shoes with the toe of my slip-on Vans. “Not everyone is so Bah Humbug, you know?”

I didn’t earn the laugh I’d been hoping for.

She went on, talking about the modesty of her mam’s home—a two-story brick house overlooking Swansea Bay. Respectable. Orderly. But nothing too elaborate. Her room, she said, was unchanged from how it had been when she was a child, complete with posters of her idols and gold-painted plastic medals hanging on the walls. Her mam liked it that way, and Dillon admitted she didn’t spend enough time there to care.

She plucked a plume from its golden stalk and rolled it between her fingers. “It’s all just very—ordinary.”

With a twinge of heartache, I realized she was nervous. Nervous about bringing me home.

Two days ago, she’d seemed to look forward to showing me where she grew up. To introducing me to her mom. But now there was an underlying hesitation. An embarrassment that hadn’t been there before.

It wasn’t difficult to guess what had happened.

“Hey.” I leaned over, resting my shoulder against hers, drawing her attention back from wherever it had wandered. “I’m still me, Dillon. Yesterday didn’t change anything. Not between us, at least. I’m still the same old Kam.”

I could feel her unconvinced inhale. And the sigh that followed. “Of course.”

“Then stop worrying, will you?” I collected her hand in mine, pressing our palms together. My nails, still meticulously manicured for the premiere, were a direct juxtaposition of hers—short and unpolished. I loved the strength of her fingers. The way endless hours in the sun brought out a hint of freckles across her knuckles. “Believe me, please, when I tell you this: I can’t wait to meet your mom. And I love singing Christmas carols. I have a weird penchant for blackened bakery goods. And to be perfectly honest, I am really looking forward to seeing what posters teenage Dillon had hanging on her walls.”

It was a relief to hear her laugh.

“Most importantly, however,” I continued with pseudo-seriousness, “I can’t wait to have the burning question answered: is it a single or double?”

Wise to my implication, she smiled, slowly, deliberately slipping her fingers between mine. It was embarrassing, almost, my physical response to the intimacy of the gesture. The way my breath caught. The way I could feel a shiver run the full length of my spine. With the simplest of touches, she’d set my body on fire, and based on the wicked gleam in her eyes, my reaction hadn’t gone unnoticed.

“And which were you hoping for, Kam-Kameryn?”

Striving to restore my sense of poise, I matched her smugness with an arch smile of my own.“Anything other than a trundle.”

It dawned on me, then, suddenly—I’d never clarified that she’d told her mom we were in a relationship. I mean, I’d assumed she had—Seren knew, after all—but I wasn’t sure. For all I knew, Jacqueline Sinclair might think we were just friends. That Dillon had told her the same bullshit story I’d told theHallwells the previous year. That I happened to be in town for work over the holidays. That I had nowhere else to go.

“Your mom,” I faltered, “she knows…?”

The dimples on Dillon’s cheeks deepened. “Knows?”

“That we…”

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