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I settled onto my knees and watched while he carefully worked his way to the edge of the bed. Emotions tangled in my throat. Somehow, it was over, and we were here to talk about it.
“And I want to give you something.” He opened the drawer of his crummy nightstand, then presented me with his closed fist. He opened his fingers.
My wedding rings sat on his palm.
I inhaled a raw breath and tears stung my eyes.
“I know you didn’t care about these,” he said as he slid my rings home, “but I did. And I’ve waited to put them back on you.”
I almost dissolved into sobs. “I cared. I wanted them back.”
“Now they’re yours.”
I bit my lower lip. “Good.”
Sterling stretched the muscles of his back on his good (well,better) side. “Does that relic actually erase and re-create bonds?”
A terrible crush rolled through me, followed by the flash of clawing at Searle,screaming, while he held me down, my naked lower body bucking and writhing because he’d pulled my pants off, and he held that vial over my head.
“Pretty wolf.” Sterling’s hand on my knee made me jump.
I snapped back to be with him, heart racing.
“Winter?”
I kicked the crush under the bed and ignored my racing heart. “We think so. We don’t know its name, but a thousand years ago, it was calledtaking the tearsorshedding tearsand there are some records in the Archives that suggest that’s what it was for. Nobody’s tested the theory yet.”
Another jolt and my heart scampered down the lane, headed in some unknown, non-specific direction at a very fast clip.
Sterling’s fingers squeezed. Reflexively, I pushed his hand off my leg, then caught myself.
“Winter,” Sterling said quietly, lifting his hand away.
I swallowed around the raw spot in my throat. The hot, quivering rush relented a bit, but the shaken feeling lingered.
“It’s like you’re looking at me from very far away,” he said. “And you smell like your nightmares, but worse. What’s the vial?Really.”
Emotions surged, and I kicked them away again. “That’s what we think it is. Wars were fought over it. It disappeared from history somewhere around 1200.”
“And?”
“And nothing,” I said softly. “That’s where the story ends.”
“Winter.”
I dug my fingers into the comforter. Which was not comforting at all. But I’d promised him honesty, so he deserved whatever details he wanted, even if I felt like I was going to start howling before I ever squeezed the words out. I wanted us to be happy, damnit.
“He wasn’t good to you,” Sterling said, searching my face while he moved closer to sniff my traitorous scent.
I flinched. “Not especially. He… he wanted what he wanted.”
His voice was low and like velvet. “Did hetakewhat he wanted?”
My throat twisted and my eyes stung andfuck, why were we doing this? I wanted to behappy, Gaia damnit. And Iwashappy. I was so fucking happy I’d circled right around to grief again. “Almost.”
“Beautiful throne, you told me—” He stopped talking. Waited for me to speak.
I hated how my voice shook. Hell,allof me shook. “He was… a pest. There were a few times… he wanted me, and I…”
