15: The Kiss

"I died in the last loop? What if I die in every loop?” she asked more softly now.

Adrian’s expression shifted slightly, and for the first time since meeting him, he looked completely honest instead of guarded.

“I don't know. What I do know is that I will save you this time.”

The answer hit harder than she expected.

Winona had spent years around people who only loved loudly when it benefited them. Her ex used grand gestures whenever he wanted forgiveness, and even before the cheating, she had constantly felt like she was fighting for attention in a relationship that drained her more than it healed her.

But Adrian looked at her like losing her had already destroyed him once before.

Winona stepped closer slowly until only inches separated them. “That’s a very intense thing to say to a woman you met yesterday.”

His gaze dropped briefly toward her lips before returning to her eyes again. “It doesn’t feel like yesterday to me.”

Something warm twisted painfully inside her chest.

So she kissed him before he could say something else devastating.

Adrian reacted immediately this time.

One hand slid firmly around her waist while the other cupped her jaw carefully, like he still could not fully believe she was real. The kiss deepened slowly, heat building between them while rain continued falling softly beyond the stone walls surrounding the jacuzzi.

Winona tangled her fingers into his damp hair while Adrian pulled her closer against him, and honestly, the man kissed unfairly well for someone who looked emotionally repressed ninety percent of the time.

When she smiled against his lips, he actually laughed quietly.

“There’s that ego again,” he murmured.

“You’re obsessed with me already. I can tell.”

“You nearly electrocuted yourself talking to a haunted mirror.”

“And yet here you are.”

His thumb brushed lightly against her cheek while he looked at her in that dangerous quiet way again.

“You joke every time you’re scared,” he said softly.

Winona’s teasing expression faded slightly.

“That obvious?”

“To me, yes.”

For a second, she almost looked away. Instead she rested her forehead lightly against his chest and let herself breathe. The sound of his heartbeat grounded her more than she wanted to admit.

“I hate this place already,” she confessed quietly. “I hate not knowing what’s real. I hate that everybody’s pretending they’re okay when we’re clearly losing our minds.”

Adrian wrapped his arms around her more tightly. “You’re handling it better than most people would.”

“That’s because I’m stubborn.”

“That’s one word for it.”

She laughed softly before looking back up at him again. “What happens now?”

“With us or the hotel?”

“Both.”

Adrian’s expression turned unreadable again, but this time she caught something warmer beneath it.

“With the hotel,” he said carefully, “things get worse before they get better.”

“And us?”

His gaze held hers for several long seconds.

“I don’t know if we survive long enough to figure that out.”

Normally a line like that would have annoyed her. Instead it made her want to kiss him again. So she did, this time slower and more dangerous somehow.

By the time they finally pulled apart, both of them were breathless and smiling slightly despite everything. Then Winona noticed something strange. The storm had stopped completely. The mountains surrounding the hotel had gone unnaturally silent.

Adrian noticed her expression immediately. “What is it?”

Winona slowly turned toward the forest beyond the stone walls.

All the lights inside the hotel were still glowing warmly behind them, but the woods ahead looked impossibly dark now, almost like the trees themselves were swallowing the moonlight.

Then she frowned slightly.

“There wasn’t a path there before,” she said quietly.

Adrian followed her gaze. A narrow lantern-lit trail now stretched deep into the forest behind the hotel. And at the very end of it a figure stood watching them.