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“You asked me before, what I would have chosen, if I had been given a choice.” Her voice is breathy, but she has swallowed back her tears.
I nod, and she looks up at me through wet lashes.
“I would have chosen this. I would have chosenyou,in whatever life I could have you.” Her hand reaches up, and she runs her delicate fingers along my jaw.
I didn’t realize how badly I needed to hear the words until she said them. That however she feels about being a princess, and one day, a queen, it would have been worth it to be with me.
That she wouldn’t hate a future here.
“Then choose this life now,” I say earnestly. “Stay.”
Sliding my hand from her back up to her face, I wipe away another tear rolling down her cheek.
“For fifteen minutes?” she jokes, the corner of her mouth turning up.
I give her a small smile in return, remembering my clumsy attempt at a proposal as well as she does.
“I was thinking something a little more permanent than that,” I say.
She takes a deep breath, pressing a kiss against my heartbeat.
“Were you? Because I’m not the only one who leaves.” Her tone is mild, apologetic, even. “Who escapes when things become too much.”
She looks up at me, as if gauging my reaction, and I wonder if she can read the guilt that stabs through my insides.
“I meant what I said tonight,” I tell her.
“I know,” she assures me. “But doing what it takes to keep me safe…it isn’t the same thing as sticking around for the fallout.”
I wonder if she, too, is remembering the room above the bar where I left her after I saved her from being discovered near the fire. She’s right. I made sure she was safe…and then I left her to fall apart alone.
With all the truths we’ve unearthed tonight, there doesn’t seem any harm in giving her one more.
“It took everything I had to walk away from you that day, or any day, really. I won’t abandon you again. Not ever. I will take the serum again if you need me to, but I’m here for the long haul, Aika. I’m here for the fallout.” I tilt her chin up, willing her to meet my eyes.
Hope and trepidation war in her gaze.
“And you?” I ask.
“Ask me again when this is over,” she pleads. “Ask me when she’s gone.”
I understand what she’s not saying. It isn’t that she doesn’t want to commit to a life with me. It’s that she can’t bear to imagine a future that might get ripped away from us.
So I nod, tilting my head down to pepper kisses along her forehead, her cheek, her jaw. “All right, but I expect you to say yes.”
“Of course,” she says. “And I expect a mountain of steamed pork buns with a jewel-encrusted dagger on top.”
I smile against her neck. “You have yourself a deal.”
CHAPTERFIFTY-FIVE
AIKA
Slow, deliberate kisses caress my neck, warm breath seeping into my skin. A familiar, tantalizing touch rakes over my ribs, squeezing my hips, tempting me gently out of my sleep.
“Good morning,” Remy whispers against the soft shell of my ear.
I open my eyes, running my fingers through his hair and wrapping my limbs around him. This is a far better wake-up than the ones I had throughout the night, the panic that would grip me when I was pulled into yet another nightmare of Remy in the dungeons, in the chair.
