Chapter Fourteen Bonnie

Chapter Fourteen

Bonnie

I didn’t know why I was looking in the mirror. I didn’t know why I cared what I looked like. I was fully aware that Saturday night was just a fluke. That Cromwell Dean would be his usual self today.

Yet here I was, checking my hair in the mirror. My hair was down and pulled to one side. I wore my jeans and a pink sweater. I had my silver hoops in my ears. I rolled my eyes at my pathetic-ness. Then my stomach fell.

You shouldn’t be doing this to either yourself or him.

I closed my eyes and counted to ten. Then I ducked out of my room. The sky was bright, the sun shining and not a cloud to be seen. Students milled about the quad. “Bonn!” Easton came up behind me and wrapped his arm around my shoulder.

“Where’ve you been?” I asked. “You weren’t in the cafeteria this morning.” I stopped and looked at my brother, using his appearance as my excuse to pause. Truth was, I was out of breath from just a few steps.

Easton shrugged. “Wasn’t in my room last night, Bonn. Let’s just save you the details about all that.”

“Thank you,” I said sarcastically, and he smiled. “I feel like I never see you lately.” I really looked at my brother. He had dark circles under his eyes. I put my hand on his bicep. “You okay?”

He winked. “Always, Bonn.” He started walking, guiding me with his arm around my shoulders. “I’ll walk you to class.”

My breathing became labored again after only a few feet. I held back the sudden onslaught of tears that threatened to fill my eyes. It was too soon. It was all happening too fast.

I hadn’t expected things to progress so quickly.

I tipped my head up and looked at the treetops. At the birds flying among them and the rustling of the turning leaves. Like summer was changing to fall, I too was losing my sun. A fated leaf, destined to fall.

Easton brought me to the music building. “Catch you later in the cafeteria, yeah?”

I smiled and kissed him on the cheek. “Yeah.” It was our standing date. Our chance each day to see each other. To catch up. If I went a day without Easton, life didn’t seem right. Easton ruffled my carefully styled hair. “East!” I admonished and rolled my eyes as he ran away, laughing. Students passed by me, entering the music building. But I watched him go. Running to a girl I didn’t know and giving her his usual bright smile and god-awful pickup lines.

My heart seemed to crack down the center. I had no idea how to tell him. I would never be able to find the words. Because I knew it would break him too. I’d held off for months. Telling myself every day that today would be the day. That I would muster up the strength. But the day never came.

And I knew it wouldn’t be long until the choice was taken from me.

He would know soon enough.

Darkness loomed over me as I thought about Easton. He was bold and larger than life on the outside, but I knew him differently. I knew the fragility that resided within him. I knew of his demons. Of the blackness that threatened to consume him.

Finding out about me…it would destroy him.

Easton’s loud laughter sailed on the wind to my ears. The hairs on the back of my neck pricked up at the sound, but I couldn’t help but smile. His energy, when good, could light up the sky.

The quad was almost empty when I finally slipped inside the door. I took my usual seat in Lewis’s class. From the minute I sat down, the butterflies swarmed in my stomach as I cast a glance back at where Cromwell usually sat. He wasn’t in class yet.

I played with the edge of my notepad as I waited. My heart bounced around in my chest, an uneven beat. I rubbed my hand over my sternum. I inhaled a long breath, focusing on my breathing the way I knew helped. On my fourth exhale, my eyes darted to the doorway. It was as though I sensed he was there.

Cromwell Dean walked into the room, wearing ripped jeans and a fitted white shirt, his tattoos framing his muscled arms and his piercings gleaming against his olive skin and messy dark hair.

He was clutching a notepad in his hand. A pen rested behind his ear. I tried to look away from him as he walked across the room toward the stairs that led him to his seat. But I couldn’t. Images of Saturday night were Technicolor flashbacks in my mind. The music room. Him, sitting behind me, hard chest against my back. His lips on my shoulder, kissing my bare skin. If I concentrated hard enough, I could still feel the softness of his lips.

My lips parted as I remembered it. I knew my face was flushed. Cromwell Dean did that to me. It was as big of a blessing as it was a fear.

As if hearing the thoughts in my head, Cromwell looked up. His eyes fixed straight on me. Every part of me tensed, apprehensive about what he would do. So when his lip hooked up at the corner, a hint of a smile aimed right at me, my pulse kicked into an erratic kind of sprint.

Infected by his smirk, I gave him the ghost of a smile back, ignoring the way the girls in the room looked at him like he was their source of warmth on a cold day. Because his attention was aimed at me. The British boy with a permanent chip on his shoulder was looking at me .

I steeled my nerves when he began walking up the stairs. His long legs ate up the path to me in no time. I expected him to walk by me, leaving me breathless in his wake. I didn’t expect him to come and sit beside me, slumping down on the seat that Bryce normally sat in.

I stared at him. He lounged back in the seat like he didn’t have a care in the world. “Farraday,” he said lazily, his accent wrapping like melting butter around my last name.

“Dean,” I whispered back. I could see other students looking our way. I shifted nervously in my seat under their attention. I turned to see him watching me. There was a light in his eyes that I hadn’t seen before. An air of peace that showed in his relaxed shoulders.

The tapping of his hand on his desk pulled my attention. The skull and numerical tattoos danced with the movement. I couldn’t take my eyes off those fingers, because I knew what they were capable of. I had seen them play the piano. And play on my guitar.

I looked up at the sound of someone clearing their throat. Bryce was standing beside us. His face was pissed, his eyes boring into Cromwell in his seat. “I sit there,” Bryce said. I hadn’t spoken to him after Friday night. I was ashamed to say that my head had been too full with Cromwell.

“Yeah? Well I’m here now,” Cromwell said, dismissing him completely. I closed my eyes, hating the confrontation.

“Why’re you such a dick?” Bryce spat.

Cromwell kept his face forward, completely ignoring him.

Bryce let out a single humorless laugh then walked past us. “Bryce,” I said, but he either ignored me or didn’t hear me. I wasn’t sure which.

“Cromwell,” I said. His stubborn expression said it all. He wasn’t moving anywhere.

Lewis came into the room. Cromwell’s leg brushed up against mine. He didn’t move it. Lewis looked around the room, and his eyebrows lifted slightly when he saw Cromwell beside me. Cromwell shifted in his seat. But then Lewis addressed the students, and class began.

* * *

Bryce was out of the classroom the minute Lewis dismissed us. I sighed as I watched him go. There was clearly no love lost between him and Cromwell.

I stood. “Bye, Cromwell.”

He got off his seat and followed me out into the quad. I thought his body would be tense and his face would be pinched. But he seemed relaxed. I’d never seen this from Cromwell before, and it confused me more than anything. He nudged his chin at me when I left to go to my next class. I shook my head as I watched him leave, wondering what all that was about. He hadn’t spoken to me apart from greeting me when he sat down. But he’d pressed his leg against mine, causing shivers to break out all over my skin. And he’d leaned in to me, his arm occasionally brushing mine. My emotions were going haywire. I had no idea what was going on with us. With him. The fact that he wasn’t glaring at me felt strange. The fact that he was almost being warm and kind…I couldn’t bring myself to believe it.

Yet I couldn’t deny that being on the receiving end of his small smile made my heart sing.

After my morning classes, I went to the cafeteria. Easton was at our usual table. I grabbed a salad and made my way over. Easton, as always, was eating enough to feed a small army.

“You got enough there, East?” I joked.

He scrunched up his nose. “Nah. Was thinking of going back for more.” Easton looked over my shoulder. “What the hell?” he said, a smirk on his mouth. I followed his gaze, and my mouth parted at what I saw.

Cromwell stood in the doorway, scanning his eyes around the room. When they fell on us, he walked right in our direction. For once, my heartbeat found a rhythm—and it was exactly in sync with Cromwell’s footsteps.

He sat beside us. He pulled a few unfamiliar candy bars from his pockets, opened one, and started eating. Easton looked at me, then back at Cromwell. “You lost, Dean?”

Cromwell finished off one candy bar and opened the next. He looked at Easton then spared a flicker of a glance to me. “No.”

Easton carried on eating, looking at Cromwell as if he were some science experiment. “You know you’re in the cafeteria, yeah?” Cromwell raised one eyebrow at Easton. Easton laughed and pointed at his candy bars. “And that they serve food here.”

Cromwell sat back. He glanced around the cafeteria. “I’m good with these.” He opened his last candy bar.

I pushed my salad around my plate. “So,” Easton said. “How’s your project coming along?”

Only silence met him. “It’s not,” I finally said. “We’re no longer partners.” I wasn’t an overly shy person. Wasn’t easily intimidated. But the images of Saturday night clogged my mind and made me lose the ability to speak around Cromwell.

Why was he here in the cafeteria? Why had he sat next to me in class yet spoken zero words but my name?

Easton glared at Cromwell. “What did you do?” Cromwell stared back at my brother. Easton always joked with people. He was always happy. But he had a side to him that people didn’t know. Especially when it came to me.

Cromwell’s jaw was clenched. I covered Easton’s hand with my own. “Nothing happened, East. Lewis saw that our work wasn’t as good together as it was apart, so he allowed us to work alone. That’s all.”

Easton narrowed his eyes, first on me, then on Cromwell. “You sure?”

“Yes,” I replied.

A wide smile decorated his face. “Then that’s okay.” He flicked his chin at me. “Weren’t feeling the EDM, sis?”

I laughed. “Not so much.”

“She just doesn’t understand it.”

I turned to face Cromwell. He finally looked at me.

“I just don’t rate it as a music genre.”

“You should,” he argued, but his voice was calm. “You just need to be shown its merits.”

His voice might have been calm, but his blue eyes were dancing with light. “I’ve heard your music,” I challenged.

I saw his lips pull up at the corner. Warmth burst in my chest. “Not properly.” I frowned at his cryptic answer.

“I need cake.” Easton rose from his seat. He eyed us both weirdly, like he was on the outside of some joke only we were in on. “Don’t kill each other while I’m gone, yeah, kids?”

“We’ll try,” I said.

The silence stretched on. Cromwell kept his gaze on the view outside the window. I glanced down at his empty candy wrappers. “Package from your mama came in, huh?”

Cromwell nodded then held out a square of chocolate from the bar he was currently demolishing. “I…I don’t eat fatty foods.” I felt my face flame. I knew the excuse sounded lame.

Cromwell ate the square. “You should learn to live a little, Farraday.”

I gave him a weak smile. “I’m trying.”

I couldn’t tell what he was reading in my face. I wanted to ask him. Wanted him to talk to me. At least mention Saturday night. But when Easton sat back down, chocolate cake on his plate, Cromwell got up. “I’m out.”

I followed him with my eyes out of the door, where he stopped near the window and pulled out a cigarette. Girl after girl looked at him as they came in for lunch. I could barely take my eyes off him myself.

Easton cleared his throat, causing me to put my focus back on my twin. He was still giving me a weird look. “There something I should know?” His voice was filled with concern.

“No.”

He clearly didn’t believe me. “Cromwell has fucked no fewer than ten girls since he got here, Bonn.”

An ache pulled in my chest at that information. “So?”

Easton shrugged. “Just thought you should know is all. Cromwell’s a screw-them-and-leave-them kind of deal.”

I flicked my hair over my shoulder. “I really don’t care, East.” Easton ate his cake. “I thought you liked him anyway?”

“I do,” East said with a mouthful of cake. He swallowed then met my eyes. “I just don’t want him anywhere near you.” His hand covered mine and his voice lowered. “You’ve been through enough, Bonn. A guy like that would chew you up and spit you out. And after everything you’ve been through…” He shook his head. “You deserve more.”

I nearly cried. Tears pricked my eyes, not just because of his words, or his protective nature. But because if he knew…if he knew what was happening to me…

“You’re my best friend, Bonn. Don’t know what I’d do without you.” Easton’s smile faltered. “You’re the only one who has ever understood me.” He blew out a long breath. “Who gets me.”

I squeezed his hand and never wanted to let go. Grief and panic stole my breath, overwhelming me. “I love you, East,” I whispered.

He smiled. “Back at you, Bonn.”

It was on the tip of my tongue to tell him. But when I looked into his blue eyes, at the pain I saw lurking underneath, I didn’t dare. Easton released my hand. He threw on his usual smile. “Gotta get to class.” He stood up. A few people came over to him, and he laughed and joked with them like always.

I’d never felt more worry for a person in my life than I did for him.

Not even myself.

I picked up my tray and cast one last glance out of the window.

Cromwell was gone. So I went to my class, wondering how everything had gotten so messed up.

* * *

“…and let the darkness fade…”

I finished my most recent song, put down my guitar, and scribbled the new lyric and chords down on the staff paper. I closed my eyes, replaying it in my head to make sure it was perfect, when there was a knock at my door. I looked up at my clock. It was nine p.m.

I looked down at myself. I was dressed in black leggings, a black top, and a white cardigan. My hair was thrown back in a messy bun. Basically, I wasn’t suited for company this late on a Friday night.

My legs ached as I walked to the door. My ankles were heavy from too much walking. I cast a quick glance around my room. The boxes were stashed in my closet. If it was Easton, I didn’t want him to see. Slapping my cheeks to bring more life to my skin, I eventually turned the knob. I opened the door just a fraction and looked out into the hallway.

Cromwell Dean was leaning against the opposite wall, hands in his black jean pockets. He was wearing a black knit sweater, sleeves rolled up to his elbows. “Farraday,” he greeted casually.

“Cromwell?”

He pushed off the wall and came to stand in front of me. He smirked. “You decent?” He pointed at the partially open door.

I flushed then opened the door the rest of the way. I wrapped my cardigan tightly around me. “Yes.” I looked down both sides of the hallway. It was empty. “What are you doing here, Cromwell?”

He had a cigarette tucked behind his ear and a chain hanging from the waistband of his jeans. “I’ve come for you.”

“What?”

“I’m taking you somewhere.”

After hours of quiet, my tired heart kicked to life. “You’re what?”

“Get some shoes on, Farraday. You’re coming with me.”

My skin broke into betraying bumps as excitement soared through me. “And where are you taking me?”

If I wasn’t mistaken, Cromwell blushed.

“Farraday, just get your shoes on and your arse out of this door.”

“I’m not dressed right.” My hand ran over my bun. “My hair’s a mess. I’m not wearing makeup.”

“You look good,” he said, and I stopped breathing. He must have seen. But he didn’t move his eyes off mine. “We’re losing time, Farraday. Let’s get going.”

I should have stayed. It wasn’t wise to let him do this. But, despite what I knew was right, what was fair, I couldn’t help it.

I had to go.

I sat down and pulled on my boots. Cromwell leaned against the doorframe, his arm stretched above his head. The black sweater clung to his arm muscles and the hem lifted, exposing a couple of inches of his tattooed stomach. My cheeks set on fire. I averted my eyes and concentrated on fastening the laces of my boots. But when I stood and saw the flicker of a smirk on his lips, I knew he’d seen me looking.

“Let’s go.” He walked out to the hallway. I let him lead the way outside and to a matte-black truck, a vintage Ford pickup.

“Is this yours?” I ran my hand over the paintwork. “It’s beautiful.”

“Yeah.”

“You just get it?” He nodded. “It must have cost you a pretty penny,” I said as we pulled out of campus.

A dimple I hadn’t even known he had popped in his left cheek. I’d almost gotten a smile. Almost. “I do all right,” he said cryptically.

“With your music?”

“I don’t spin for free, Farraday.” I knew he was the most streamed EDM DJ in Europe—hell, maybe the U.S. too for all I knew. I hadn’t really thought of him like that. I’d forgotten he was Cromwell Dean, up-and-coming EDM star. It seemed crazy to me.

Especially when I knew what he could create in classical.

Cromwell had sat with Easton and me every lunchtime this week. He’d sat beside me in all the classes we shared. He had hardly spoken, but he’d been there. I didn’t know what to make of it.

I certainly didn’t know what to make of right now.

“So, any clues to where we’re going?”

Cromwell shook his head. “You’ll just have to wait and see.” I couldn’t help it; I laughed.

“You’re not at the bar tonight, or at the Barn? Won’t all your adoring fans—and by fans I mean girls—miss you?”

“I’m sure they’ll survive,” he said dryly. It only made me smile wider.

Cromwell pulled out onto the freeway. I frowned, wondering where we were going. “Can I put your radio on?” I asked.

Cromwell nodded his head. When I switched it on, I wasn’t surprised to hear fast tempos, pounding crescendos, and slamming beats. EDM. I sighed. “I guess this comes with the territory, huh? If I’m in your car?”

“What do you have against EDM?” he asked. He kept glancing between me and the road.

“Nothing, really. I just don’t know how you could pick this over all the other genres.”

“You like folk.”

“I like acoustic folk. I write the music and the lyrics.”

“I create the beats, the rhythms, and the tempos.” He turned up the current track. “This is one of my most recent.” He looked at me. “Close your eyes.” I raised my eyebrow. “Just shut them, Farraday.” I did as he asked. “Listen to the breakdown. Really listen. Hear the beat and how it carries the base of the song. Hear the layers. How the tempo changes with each sound, the keyboard, how they overlap until I have five or six layers that all work seamlessly.” I did. I let myself use all my senses to drink it in, shedding each layer one by one until I heard all of the composition. My shoulders moved to the beat, the tempo controlling my movements. And I felt myself smile. I built back the layers in my head, until they were a fusion of sounds and rhythms and beats.

“I hear it,” I said, so quietly I didn’t know if he could hear me over his music. When I opened my eyes, Cromwell turned down the volume. I sighed in defeat. “I heard it,” I said again.

Cromwell glanced at me from the side of his eye. “I think you’re a music snob, Farraday.”

“What?”

He nodded. “Classical, folk, country, any other genre, really. All but EDM. Computer-created sounds.” He shook his head. “You’re a snob.” I didn’t know why, but being called a snob in an English accent made it feel so much worse.

“I’m not at all. I…I…”

“I what?” he said, and I could hear the smile in his voice.

“I really don’t like you at times,” I said, fully understanding that I sounded like a two-year-old.

“I know you don’t,” he said, but there was no belief in his tone. Because as much as I hadn’t liked Cromwell Dean, I was beginning to. That was a lie. I already liked him.

And that’s what terrified me.

Cromwell pulled into the road that led to the Jefferson Museum. I sat in confusion as he pulled us to a stop at the nearly deserted parking lot. “I think it’s closed,” I said as Cromwell got out of the truck. He opened my door and held out his hand. “Come on.”

I slid my hand in his, trying to keep it from shaking. I thought he’d let go of my hand as we made our way down the path to the entrance. But he didn’t. He kept tight hold. I tried to keep up with him, but I couldn’t. Cromwell stopped. “You okay? You’re limping.”

“I twisted my ankle,” I said, feeling the tinny taste of lies on my tongue.

“Can you walk?” The truth was, it was becoming more and more difficult. But I wouldn’t give up.

I was determined to fight.

“I can walk if we go slow.”

Cromwell walked slowly beside me. “Do I get any clue yet as to what we’re doing here at the museum after hours?” I pulled on his arm. “You’re not gonna break us in, are you?”

Cromwell’s dimple popped again. A single dimple on his left cheek. The sight pulled at my heart. “It’s the tattoos, isn’t it?” he said.

I fought a laugh. “The piercings, really.” As if on cue, Cromwell rolled his tongue and his tongue ring came between his teeth. My face set on fire when I remembered how it had danced so close to mine. I hadn’t kissed him enough yet to feel its full effect.

I couldn’t let that happen at all.

“Don’t worry, Sandra Dee. I’ve got permission to be here.”

The security guard must have expected us, because he let us straight through. “Second floor,” he said.

“I’ve been here this week already.” Cromwell led us toward the stairs. He quickly looked back at me, then took us to the elevator. I melted a little.

As the elevator doors closed, Cromwell stayed right by my side. “Any clue yet?” I asked, when the proximity and strained silence got too much.

“Patience, Farraday.”

We got out of the elevator and stopped in front of a closed door. Cromwell ran his hand through his hair. “You said you wanted to know what it felt like.” He opened the door and led me inside a dark room. He pulled me by the hand to the center then moved to the side. I squinted, trying to see what he was doing, but I could barely see in front of me.

Then Mozart’s Requiem in D Minor flooded through speakers hidden somewhere in the walls. I smiled as the music filled the room.

And then I sucked in a quick breath. Lines of color started dancing along the black walls. Reds and pinks and blues and greens. I stood, mesmerized, as with each note another color burst against the walls. Shapes formed on one wall, triangles, circles, squares. And I let it wash over me. As the music poured into my ears, colors flared in my eyes.

I drank it all in. This was synesthesia. It had to be. Cromwell had brought me here to show me what he saw. When the piece ended and the walls faded to black, Cromwell came over to me. I turned to him, wide-eyed and filled with so much awe it was overwhelming.

“Cromwell,” I said, and a line of bright yellow splashed along the walls. I threw my hand over my mouth, laughing when it happened again.

Cromwell brought a couple of beanbags over from the side of the room. He placed them side by side and said, “Sit.”

A flash of pale blue darted across the walls as he spoke. I did as he said, grateful for the reprise. I stared up at the ceiling; it too was painted black. I turned to Cromwell, his face already watching mine. He was so close to me. Our arms already touching. “It’s what you see, isn’t it?”

He looked at the lines of color that flickered in tune with our words. “It’s like it.” He studied the blue that came when he spoke. “It’s based on someone else. My colors are different.” He tapped his ear. “I hear Requiem differently. My colors aren’t in tune with this one.”

I tilted my head to the side. “So y’all hear colors differently?”

“Mmm-hmm.”

Cromwell lay back on the beanbag. They were put here, I guessed, for this reason. So you could lie back and see the colors colliding with the music. A full sensory experience. I watched Cromwell. Watched as he caught the dying embers of the colored lines. This was how he lived. This was his norm.

“You said before that you didn’t just see colors when music played…” I left the sentence hanging there.

Cromwell put his arms behind his head. He rolled his head to me. “No.” He became lost in thought. “I can taste it too. It’s not strong. Certain sounds or scents leave tastes in my mouth. Not really specific, but sweet or sour. Bitterness. Metallic.” He laid one hand on his chest. “Music…it makes me feel things. Certain types of music make my emotions more heightened.” His voice was clipped as he said the last part, and I knew without asking that there was something more behind that.

Then I wondered if it was classical that made his emotions heightened. Maybe too heightened to cope with. Or if it somehow reminded him of something painful. I wondered if that’s why he ran from it.

Cromwell rolled over to face me. I lost my breath as he studied me. I had just opened my mouth to ask him what he was thinking when he said, “Sing.”

“What?” My heart began its unmelodic beat.

“Sing.” He pointed up at the ceiling, at the black walls, at small microphones planted in the ceiling’s crevices. “The song you sang at the coffee house.”

I felt my face light with fire. Because the last time we sang, Cromwell had been behind me, his chest to my back. “Sing,” he said again.

“I don’t have my guitar.”

“You don’t need it.”

I stared into Cromwell’s eyes and saw the pleading there. I had no idea why he wanted me to sing it. I had sung as much as I could of late. It was getting harder and harder, my breathing robbing me of my greatest joy. My voice had lost strength, yet I hadn’t lost passion.

“Sing,” he said again. There was a desperation on his face. One that made me melt. In this moment, begging me to sing, he looked beautiful.

Even though I was scared, I pushed through. It was the way I lived. I always tried to face my fears head-on. Closing my eyes, needing to escape Cromwell’s stare, I opened my mouth and let the song free. I heard my voice, weakened and strained, sail out around the room. I heard Cromwell’s breathing beside me. And I felt him when he moved closer to my side.

“Open your eyes,” he whispered into my ear. “See your song.”

I let go and just let Cromwell lead. I opened my eyes and lost my rhythm when I was bathed in a cocoon of pinks and purples. Cromwell’s fingers ran across mine. “Keep going.”

With my eyes locked on the ceiling, I sang. Tears sprang to my eyes as my words brought forth colors so beautiful I felt them down to my soul. As my voice sang the final word, I blinked the tears away. I watched the final line of pink fade to white, then nothing.

The silence in the aftermath was thick. My breathing was labored. It was labored as I felt the heavy stare of Cromwell’s blue eyes on me. I took three deep breaths then turned his way.

I didn’t get time to look into his eyes. I didn’t get time to see his dimple in his left cheek. I didn’t get time to ask him if he saw the pinks and purples of my voice, because the second I turned, his hands cupped my face and his lips pressed to mine. A shocked cry sounded in my throat when I felt him against my mouth. His hands were hot against my face. His chest was pressed flush against mine. But as his lips started to move, I melted into him. Cromwell’s taste of mint, chocolate, and tobacco slipped into my mouth. My hands reached out and clutched his sweater. His musky scent filled my nose, and I let his soft lips work against mine.

Cromwell kissed me. He kissed me and kissed me in soft, slow kisses, until his tongue pushed against the seams and slid into my mouth. He groaned as his tongue met mine. He was everywhere. I felt him everywhere, my body and senses swept away by the hurricane that was Cromwell Dean.

I moved my tongue with his. Then I felt the cold metal of his tongue ring and sank into him further. Cromwell Dean kissed like he played music—completely and with every ounce of his soul.

He kissed me and kissed me until I had no breath left in my body. I broke away, gasping. But Cromwell wasn’t finished. As I searched for air, for any way to fill my lungs and calm my pounding heart, he moved down my neck. My eyes fluttered closed, and I held on to his sweater like it was my lifeline from being swept away by everything that was Cromwell. His warm breath drifted down my neck and caused goose bumps to spread over my skin.

I looked up, and I saw bright greens and lilac purples dancing around us—the color of our kisses.

But it was too much. My chest tightened at the exertion, at the all too encompassing heaviness that was this kiss. I moved my head to tell him so, to break away, but in a second, Cromwell’s lips were back on mine. The minute I felt them, I was his. I sank back into the soft cushion beneath me and let him take my mouth. Cromwell’s tongue met mine, and he shifted his body until it lay over me. My hands moved to his back. His sweater had ridden up as he moved over me. My palms met warm skin, the feel of it heightening every sense I had.

“Cromwell,” I whispered. Orange flashed over the ceiling. “Cromwell,” I repeated, smiling when the same color returned. But that smile faded when I realized what we were doing. That I shouldn’t be here. Shouldn’t have let him kiss me. I should have walked away when I still had the chance.

I squeezed my eyes shut and hung on to him like I would never let him go. I deepened the kiss. I kissed him so I would never forget. I kissed him until he was imprinted on my soul.

I eventually pulled back, moving my hands up Cromwell’s body until my hands shadowed his and I cupped his cheeks. His lips were swollen from the kiss, and his stubbled cheeks were warm.

“I can’t.” My heart cracked in two at the confession. “We can’t do this.”

Cromwell searched my face. “Why?”

“I need to get home.”

Cromwell’s eyebrows pulled down in confusion. “Bonn—”

“Please.”

“Okay.”

He got up from the beanbag and moved silently across the room to the lights. I flinched at the invading brightness. In the light, the walls were just black. The magic had gone.

I watched Cromwell move around the room making sure everything was switched off. He came toward me, and as his eyes fell upon me, I couldn’t believe how someone could be so handsome. When he stopped, his feet at mine, he dropped a single long kiss on my forehead.

The room shimmered, and I felt a tear escape my eye. He went to move away, but I grabbed his wrists, savoring him just a little more. Cromwell looked down, a serious expression on his face. I never moved my eyes away. I kept my eyes on him as I moved in, shifting to my tiptoes. I didn’t let myself think this time; I just followed my heart and pressed my lips to his. It was the first time I’d ever initiated a kiss in my life. I would never have believed it would be with Cromwell Dean. But now that we were here, like this, suspended in this most perfect of moments, I knew it would never have been anyone but him.

As I pulled away, I let my forehead fall to his. I breathed him in, committing every second to memory. I lifted my head and met his eyes. A burning question was in my mind. “What did it look like to you?” I asked. “My song. The colors.”

Cromwell breathed in, then, eyes bright, said, “It illuminated the room.”

I sagged against him, resting my head on his chest, my arms around his waist. “It illuminated the room.”

Cromwell led me out of the museum and into his truck. No music played as we made our way home. We didn’t talk either. But it was a comfortable silence. I couldn’t speak. I had a million questions I wanted to ask him. But I didn’t. I had to leave this night exactly where it belonged. In the past. As a memory I’d keep to help me through the journey ahead.

“It illuminated the room…”

Cromwell pulled up in front of my dorm. I looked at the entrance with a sense of dread. When I was through that door, this would all end. Whatever this was. I still wasn’t sure myself.

Cromwell sat in his seat, his eyes on me. I could feel it. And I didn’t want to look his way. Because I knew that when I did, I had to end it.

“Cromwell,” I whispered, hands in my lap.

“Farraday.” I wished he hadn’t just said that. I liked the way he had always called me that. Only now when he said it, it was breathtaking to me. Just like his music.

“I can’t.” My voice sounded too loud in the old truck’s cabin. Cromwell didn’t ask what I couldn’t do. He knew what I meant. When I finally looked up at him, he was staring straight out of the window and his jaw was clenched. In that moment, he was the Cromwell I knew from the first days of school.

I squeezed my eyes shut, hating to see him this way. I didn’t want to hurt him. I had no idea what he thought of me, but by the way he’d acted this past week, what he did for me after the coffee house performance, and what he showed me tonight…I knew it had to be something real. And that kiss… “I…I can’t explain…”

“I like you,” he said, and as the sweetly accented words hit my ear, I wanted to move across the seat and wrap my arms around him. I didn’t know Cromwell well, but I knew he didn’t say those words easily. He lived behind high walls, yet with me, they had started to lower.

I didn’t want to be the cause of them growing back high. In my heart I wanted to be the one to smash them until he was free. But I couldn’t. It just wasn’t fair.

A sudden wave of anger hit me. At the unfairness. That I couldn’t just be here right now, enjoying the moment, falling into his arms.

“Bonnie?” I wanted to sob when my name left his lips. He’d never called me Bonnie before.

“I like you too.” I looked into his blue eyes. I owed him that much. “But it’s more complicated than that. I shouldn’t have let it get this far. It isn’t fair. I’m so sorry…”

The feel of his hand slipping into mine silenced me. “Come with me to Charleston tomorrow night.”

“What?”

“I’m playing at a club.” He held my hand tighter. “I want you to come.”

“Why?”

“To see…” He sighed. “To see me play my new mixes. To stand beside me and see how it is. To make you understand. It’s only an hour away.”

“Cromwell, I—”

“East is coming.” Disappointment dripped off him in waves. “It doesn’t have to be anything you don’t want it to be.”

I wasn’t sure I could be around East either. When Sunday came, I would have to tell him. And Cromwell would no doubt find out too.

I thought of one night. One last night where I got to be free. Surrounded by music and Cromwell. My brother and us, sharing laughs. “Okay,” I said. “I’ll come. But I have to come back here afterward.”

Cromwell’s lips pursed, the promise of a small smile. “Good,” he said. “Let’s get you into bed, Farraday.”

Cromwell got out of the truck and held my door open like before. And like before, he held out his hand for me. He held my hand until he brought me to the door of the dorm. My heart flip-flopped in my chest when he faced me. He put his hands on my face and pressed a single, soft kiss to my lips. “Night.”

He turned and walked off. I wasn’t sure I could move. Then, just before he got into his truck, I said, “Cromwell?” He looked up. I could feel my cheeks burning before I even spoke. “What color is my voice?”

Cromwell stared at me, eyes full of some kind of light I couldn’t decipher. That small, beautiful smile pulled on his lips again, and he said, “Violet blue.”

I tried to breathe. I really did. I tried to move. Violet blue. Cromwell got in his truck and pulled away. A memory from last week came to my mind.

“Cromwell?” I asked, and he turned my way. “What’s your favorite? Your favorite color to see?”

“Violet blue,” he said in an instant.

Violet blue. His favorite color to see…and also the sound of my voice.

If my failing heart hadn’t let him in before, it did just then.