“What did Lyn say to you?”
“What?” He’d been so deep in his musings that her question caught him off guard.
“When you confronted her? What did she say to you?”
Compared to all the other things that Lyn and Pete had done to him, the defense she’d made that night was nothing. But for him, those words—
He didn’t want to tell Haven. It would open him even more to her, render him that much more vulnerable when it turned out he was alone in his feelings. And yet, he couldn’t stop himself from answering. Haven made him want to spill everything.
“She apologized. For her mistake.”
“Isn’t that good?”
“She said she’d meant the things she’d said to me, but then she’d realized—that I just didn’t have the talent to make it on my own.”
Even now it stung. He’d seen the regret on Lyn’s face, the sincerity of her sorrow at having misjudged him. His sense of his own talent and possibility had shut down. And part of him waited, now, for Haven to look at him with the same regret, the way you looked at someone you’d broken bad but inevitable news to. The patient may not make it till morning.
You don’t have the talent...
But Haven was shaking her head. “She’s wrong. She’s just wrong. Maybe she figured out that you’re not cut out to be a pop musician, but you already knew that. I heard you play blues, Mark. God. You play. You made me believe. I went home and bought, like, three blues albums. But you know? I wanted to buy yours. I wanted to lie on my bed with earbuds in and let you fill up my head. Hell, I wanted to be you and know I had that kind of passion in me.”
The intimacy of her words shook something loose in his chest, and it moved and rattled and cut off his ability to say anything. But he knew his eyes were full of his gratitude.
“And you’re amazing with those music lessons. That kid. Gavin. You know that spell in the Harry Potter movies, where Dumbledore uses his wand to pull thoughts out of his head, the tip of the wand kind of draws this little thought thread right out—?” She gestured. “That’s what it’s like. Like Gavin has all this music in him and you know how to get it out.”
He felt himself warm with pleasure and embarrassment as she spoke. Her praise was like a spell.
“Also,” she said, but cut herself off with a shake of her head. “Sorry, I should shut up before I get myself in more trouble.”
“What?”
For a moment she wouldn’t look at him. Then she slowly lifted her gaze, and he saw a mix of emotions there that matched his: confusion, desire, uncertainty. “The music issue aside,” she said, “Lyn’s an idiot if she didn’t appreciate your other talents.”
8
“MY OTHER— OH.”
Color rushed into Mark’s face, and that was enough to get Haven’s blood going, moving hot and fast through her veins, swelling her up with need.
Haven wasn’t sure what she was doing, but she wanted something more to happen between them. She wouldn’t have brought Wednesday up otherwise. It was sheer provocation.