“Ouch!” I took a step backward, rubbing my forehead, trying to sort out in my mind what had just happened.

“I’m sorry, Rosalie,” he whispered, and for a moment, I thought I had to be mistaken.

I thought it was Ethan I had run into.

It smelled like him.

It felt like him.

When I glanced up at him through my eyelashes, it looked like him.

But when I heard those two words come from between his lips, I thought I had to be mistaken, and Soren must’ve come back early from his trip.

There ...