Rohan dumped the magnet poetry onto the table. Savannah took up position to his right. Without even a glance in his direction, she began laying the words out face up, efficient and precise, each word a half inch from the next. By the time Savannah had the entire magnet poetry kit laid out in three evenly spaced lines, Rohan had already finished his preliminary assessment of the set.

“Twenty-five words total,” he commented.

“Only four verbs.” Savannah’s pale hair was braided back from her face in a complicated twist that reminded Rohan of a tiara, but there was nothing princess-like about the way she assessed the spread before them, her palms flat on the table, sinewy muscles visible in her arms. She looked like a general preparing for battle. “Burned, is, will, and be.”

Rohan pulled three of the four, rearranging their order.

“It seems a poor strategy to use all of the verbs in one go,” Savannah said intently.

“Are you suggesting we ration our verbs?” Rohan smirked.

She ignored him, scanned the word bank, and pulled three others. “These are the only ones that could even possibly go with your little

combination there.”

There was no hesitation in Savannah Grayson. It was like she was incapable of it.

She’d pulled the word the and two nouns. “Skin.” Rohan allowed himself to linger on that word for a moment. There were benefits to letting yourself want someone if strategy called for making them want you. “And rose.” Rohan drew a finger across the remaining word, then slid it and the word the into place.

“The rose petal.” Savannah was already on the move.

Rohan was beside her in a flash. “Up for a little bonfire, winter girl?” The title suited her. The hair. The eyes. Though Rohan had to admit: She was far more woman than girl.

“Burning anything would be premature and rash.” Savannah looked back to the bank of magnetic words. Rohan wondered which ones jumped out to her. Danger? Cruel? Fast? Touch? Fair? “And besides,” she continued crisply, “to burn anything, we’d need matches or a lighter, which we do not have.”

“Matches, a lighter, or…” Rohan waited until her eyes flicked toward his. “A beam of light and a concave mirror.”