Page 161 of Anton

My thumb brushes over her knuckles. “A week.”

“Oh God. I’m sorry.” Her brow furrows.

“What are you sorry for, printsessa?”

“For making you all worry. My family must have been going nuts.”

“Everyone is happy you’re awake.”

Silence hangs between us before I say the one thing I can’t keep buried anymore.

“I’m the one who should be sorry.”

“Anton, no. Don’t.” Her weak smile rips into me as she picks up my hand and brings it to her lips. “We’re past you trying to kill me and everything.” She coughs out a laugh.

“It’s not just that.” My fingers squeeze hers. “This is my fault. I let you leave. I fucking let you leave.”

More tears gather in her eyes, and she kisses my knuckles again. “I’m alive because you found me, baby. Don’t do that to yourself.”

My forehead drops to hers. I don’t deserve her forgiveness. But I’ll take it anyway.

“I don’t know if I will ever be normal, Thora.” I pitch back, my gaze fastening with hers, an unending bond no one can break, not anymore. “I don’t know if I can give you what another man could. I don’t even understand half of what I feel when I look at you, but I know I would burn the world down to keep you. You are in every part of me now, and if that is love, then I love you.”

Her face crumples, and I brush my knuckles along the edge of her cheek.

“I love you,” I repeat, the words hurting and healing me at the same time. “I love you, Thora Whitlock, with everything I have left in me.”

Tears slip down her temple into her hair. “I don’t need you to be normal. I love you for who you are. You’re enough, Anton. You have always been enough for me. I just needed you to see it.”

My eyes close as I hold her against me.

“You’re enough.” The words press into my chest as she repeats them, each one reaching another broken part of me until I almost believe her.

When I lift my head, I cup her face. “I don’t deserve you.”

“Too bad.” Her fingers move weakly over the top of my hand. “You’re stuck with me.”

“I like being stuck with you.”

She laughs. “I love you too, you big dummy.”

Her arms come around me, her cheek settling against my chest.

I want to believe this is real. That I have something that makes me feel whole. That she found the fractured pieces my father left behind and held them together until I remembered I was a man, not the hollow thing he tried to create.

Her fingers trace the edge of my jaw as her eyes search my face. “I think I saw your mother.”

Everything inside me goes still. “What?”

“When I was…wherever I was.” She tips her face toward the ceiling, exhaustion weighing down each word. “It was dark, and I couldn’t find my way out, but there was a woman. She had your eyes, and she told me I couldn’t stay there. She said her boy needed me, so I came back.”

I can’t breathe. For a few seconds, all I can do is hold on to the hope that my mother is really out there, still watching over me.

My hand covers Thora’s, and I send a silent thank-you to the woman who gave me life and somehow sent back the only good thing I’ve ever had.

For that alone, I will be grateful until the day that I die.

THORA