Page 73 of You'll Be the Death of Me

Cole looked even more dazed now. And like he really wanted to keep kissing her. “What was me?”

“Last year, I went on a trip to Tahoe with Jason and my brothers and a few other friends. Jason and I were skiing one day, and this guy crashed into me on the mountain. I didn’t get a very good look at him, but he was very polite and apologetic. The crash left a giant bruise on my thigh.”

She pulled her skirt higher and pointed to where it had been. Jason had said it was shaped like Italy. A clear memory of the wiggly purple blotch came back to her now.

She looked up to see Cole eyeing her bare thigh like he wanted to bite it and like he was struggling to make sense of what she was saying.

“I think it wasyou, Cole. The guy on the mountain.That’swhy you smell like snow to me, and why I keepseeingvisions of us. In the snow!”

He gaped at her, at a loss. “Are you sure it was me?”

“Like ninety percent, yes. But we need Jason to confirm. He brought the whole thing up just yesterday, before all this, when he was trying to talk me out of marrying Tommy.” She gasped and slapped her hand over her mouth when a realization struck her. “He can’t see you! This whole time, he doesn’t know what you look like. If he’d seen you from the start, maybe... I don’t know, but maybe. We need to show him your face!”

Cole was still staring at her, obviously reeling. “Wait. You really think we’ve met before? Back when I was... alive?” Desperate excitement dripped from his question.

“Yes,” she said emphatically, thrilled to give him any information about his life he so clearly wanted to have. More of that day was coming back to her now in bits and pieces. She shut her eyes, willing the memories to surface. “You were wearing a blue jacket—no, green. You said sorry like a hundred times and offered to buy me a drink at the lodge. I said thank you but brushed you off because I had just met Tommy and already had sights on marrying him to make my parents happy. I’d also just opened Pergo and was drowning. Jason practically had to drag me on that trip because I was so preoccupied with the restaurant getting off the ground.”

As she described it, she wondered, what if she’d said yes to that drink? What if she’d gone back to the lodge with him and gotten to know him in a reality where they were both alive? What if a different decision in that moment would have rerouted her whole life?

She pushed herself to standing, suddenly feeling the need. “Cole, what if this is the...thing.”

He stood too and looked at her with a serious if not curious furrow to his brow. “What thing?”

Dell was already ten steps ahead, still mentally stumbling through it all, but it was making more and more sense. “Thewrong turn!” She began pacing tight circles in the limited space and dramatically gesturing as she thought out loud. “What if we were supposed to meet that day? I mean, wedidmeet, but what if we were meant to do more? What if we were supposed to end up like in my visions where we are... together?” She stopped walking only because Cole grabbed her hand and yanked her toward him. They were suddenly face-to-face.

“You are walking too close to the edge. It’s making me nervous,” he said from a breath away.

“Sorry,” she said, and looked up at him in excited wonder. “But what if I’m right? What if it’sus?” She gestured between them, feeling a swell of hope they might have found a solution, along with a surge of butterflies at what it could mean.

Cole studied her face for a few seconds before he moved his hands to her jaw to pull her lips back to his.

The kiss caught Dell off guard, but she welcomed it. He slid his tongue back into her mouth, and she tasted the stars. The entire universe narrowed to the heat between them, the soft push and pull of his lips, the way he tenderly cupped her face. She could have died, again, in the moment and wouldn’t have minded.

Cole pulled back, still holding her face, and it took Dell several seconds to gain her bearings. “Sorry,” he said. “I just wanted to test and see if kissing you again would snap us both back to life. You know, in case you’re correct about this being the wrong turn.” He coyly twisted his swollen lips, and Dell knew he was only using it as an excuse.

“Sure,” she said with a grin of her own. “Best to turn every leaf.”

“Look under every stone,” he said.

“Do you want to keep looking? You know, just to be sure.”

“Good idea.”

He pulled her in again, never having let go. Dell wrapped her arms around his neck and let out a little squeal when he lifted her. He moved his hands to grip beneath her thighs, and she hitched her legs up around his waist, crossing her feet behind his back. More soft, needy sounds came from his throat, and she clung to him tighter.

He briefly paused to pull back and ask a question. “Are you sure this is okay? I know you just ended things with your fiancé today.”

“He’s dead to me,” Dell said in a hurry, and felt Cole’s smile when she greedily pressed her mouth back to his. He took a step to one side, and then the other, as if he were searching for a flat surface to press her up against, but aside from lying down on the tower, they were out of luck. Dell didn’t really care though. She’d have lain down anywhere if it meant she got to keep kissing him and maybe do other things too.

Cole’s hands had inched their way higher on the backs of her bare thighs as she squeezed herself as close as possible. She’d fisted her hands in his hair and was ready to tackle him when a loudding!pulled their attention from devouring each other.

“What was that?” Dell asked, out of breath, and still squeezing his hair in her fists.

Cole looked down beside them, where his tablet had lit up inside his satchel. Even from a distance, Dell could see the symbol for a new message alert. Cole frowned at it with a sigh and a look like he wanted to kick it off the bridge and into the ocean for interrupting them.

Dell unthreaded her legs from around his waist and slid down until her feet met a solid surface. “Wait, does that say it’s from Maxine Vanguard? Isn’t she Robbie’s mom’s case manager?”

Cole let go of her, curious now too. “Yes, she is.”