“I’ll go too,” Ben offered.
“Are you sure?” Rayna asked. “’Cause I was really, really hoping you could help me with my AP History homework. It’s a nightmare.”
Oh, she was good. She looked pleadingly at Ben. He had been played by a master. If he didn’t want to look like a total jerk, he had to agree.
“Okay, I’ll help you,” he said.
“Thank you!” she gushed. She winked at me as Sage and I headed out the door. We didn’t say anything until we were in Rayna’s car and driving, enveloped in the darkness of the night.
“Think Ben has any idea?” Sage asked.
I had been carrying on an intense internal monologue, trying to imagine the best way to start the right conversation, and his voice took me by surprise. “What?”
Sage smiled. “You don’t think Rayna was giving us a chance to be alone?”
I turned to look at him. The light from the dashboard glowed on his face, and the knowing look in his eyes made my heart skip.
Rayna had told me to go with how I felt.
I felt like grabbing his face and kissing him.
But I couldn’t. Not yet. I needed to know what he was thinking, what he felt, who he was. With a silent apology to Rayna, I pulled the car onto the shoulder and put it into park. The road was fairly desolate, lit only by sparse streetlamps, and the even sparser flow of other cars’ headlights.
Sage looked at me, waiting.
I looked at the steering wheel.
“How does it work?” I asked, turning to face him. “How do you know where to find me … us?”
Sage’s eyes registered shock, but only for a moment.
“You know,” he said.
I nodded.
“How?”
Everything would change once I said it out loud. Should I even do it?
“I have dreams,” I admitted. “I’ve had them since I first saw you in the pictures. Dreams of us together … only it’s not really us.”
“No?” he asked. His voice was calm, but his hand gripped the armrest.
My heart thudded against what I wanted to say. “In the dreams I’m them. All of them: Olivia, Catherine, Anneline, Delia …”
I spoke gently, but it was as if I struck him with each name. His eyes shadowed. I wondered if I was making a mistake. Should I stop? I couldn’t.
“I thought they were fantasies at first, but they’re not. I’m dreaming in memories. Their memories. My memories.”
Sage clenched his jaw. He closed his eyes and pressed his fist to his temple.
“I have these dreams,” I continued, “and I feel what they felt … the way they felt about you. And then I look at you, right here in front of me, and it’s all there, and I want to trust it, but … I don’t know what’s real.” I took a deep breath and stared at the emblem in the center of the steering wheel, so I wouldn’t have to look at his reaction. “How do you feel about me?”
It sounded so stupid, but it felt monumental. I felt totally exposed.
“Clea … look at me,” he said.
“I can’t.”
“Look at me.”
I turned to face him.
“Why are you looking at my nose?” he asked. “My eyes, Clea.”
I met his eyes. They were rich and deep, unguarded for the first time outside my dreams.
“Do you really need to ask how I feel about you?”
I didn’t. I saw now that all the things I felt, he did too … but I was still insecure. I didn’t want to push him away with all my questions, but I had to ask one more.
“Is it me, or is it them? Who do you see when you look at me?”
“I see you,” he answered as if it were obvious. “It’s not like I see a place, or a time, or a name: just you. Your essence. Your soul. That’s how I find you every time you come back. I know it’s hard to understand, but your soul calls me … and I’m drawn to it. I couldn’t keep away if I tried.”
Sage raised his hand to my cheek, cupping it gently. I closed my eyes, resting against the warmth of his palm. When I opened them he had moved closer.
I closed the distance between us and kissed him.
I felt dizzy and hot and floaty, like every cliché … but it was true. I couldn’t feel my feet. I finally felt like I was where my soul belonged.
There was only one problem. The gearshift was digging into my side.
“Ow!” I winced.
“You okay?”
“Yeah … it’s just …” I gestured down, feeling like an idiot for ruining the moment.
Sage didn’t seem to mind. He reached down and moved his seat back to its maximum leg room, then held out his hand. I grabbed it and clambered over the center console, clumsily ducking and folding myself until I finally settled onto his lap, straddling his legs. It was the least coordinated act of seduction ever.
“Better?” he asked.
“Better.”
He kissed me, sliding his hands up the back of my shirt. It felt incredible. Without breaking away from his lips, I reached underneath his tee and felt his bare, sleek chest. My breath came faster, caught up in the frenzy of finally letting go and doing what I’d been dying to do from the second I’d seen Sage on the beach.