“If you had asked me, I would have said the same thing for my birthday. But then you gave me that,” she said, gesturing toward the vignette still awaiting its proper home on her nightstand. “Somehow, it was exactly what I didn’t know was missing from my life.”
Deckard smiled, proud of his gift. The moment he’d seen it in the small shop in Blacklion, he would have sold the very clothes off his back to have it.
Evylin tightened her grip on his hand. “I want to know you, Jonn,” she whispered, “in the same way you know me.”
Appreciative of the sentiment, Deckard dipped down to kiss her. “I’ll tell you anything you want to know,” he promised.
Drawing back in thought, Evylin took his offer seriously. It was charming to see her work so hard to understand him, even if he didn’t feel the necessity of it. Their souls were Bonded, and she could sense his every emotion. How much more understanding did she need?
Evylin took a deep breath, then asked her first question. “Is Jonn short for Jonnathan?”
An abrupt laugh burst out of him. “No. It’s just Jonn.”
“Just Jonn?” She smiled. “So your parents weren’t pretentious like mine, then?”
“What do you mean?”
“They didn’t give you a middle name.”
“Ah. They did, actually.”
She waited expectantly.
“It’s Marc.”
Evylin pursed her lips in consideration. “Jonn Marc Deckard,” she said and tipped her head. “That’s rather...boring.”
He grinned dryly. “We can’t all have names as elegant as yours.”
She let out a mocking guffaw. “You don’t know my middle name.”
“Don’t I?” he said, reaching out one finger to brush the silver pendant hanging over her open collar. Its rosette design matched her middle name. Evylin Rosette. Such a feminine name for such a fierce woman.
Evylin’s lips parted in surprise. “How do you—?”
“The same way I know your birthday,” he interrupted. “It’s on our marriage contract.”
“And you remember it?”
“I have a copy of it.”
“Oh. Right.”
Though it was standard practice for two contracts to be designed—one for the magistrate’s records and one for the groom—there was no reason Evylin would have thought about the document. Deckard had kept it stored in his trunk for the entirety of their travels with the Third Volunteer Company, and as she’d never had a use for it, she’d not seen it after their ceremony.
“Where is it?” Evylin asked.
“In the study,” he said. “Once we arrived, I put it with other important documents, like my contract and past orders.”
“Pastorders? Why keep those?”
“I like to be prepared should anyone ever question my work.”
Evylin hummed in thought, pulling away from him. He could tell she was working up another question, and he reached for his wine glass waiting on the nightstand. Evylin eyed him as he took a sip.
Suddenly, she asked another question. “Why can’t you say no to wine?”
Deckard forced himself to swallow rather than scoff. “I can say no.”
