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“This is the last time you’re allowed to feel guilty, do you hear me? If you need my forgiveness, you have it. But you also have my thanks. I’ve survived the worst that could possibly happen. That constant fear, that insistent need to hide and pretend are all gone. I can be me, Neri. I can claim you. Forever.”
My voice turned soft. “I could never have married you, askim. Never have bought a home with you. Never been safe to live a normal life without fear of being hurt or deported. I think...I think that’s why I struggled to move on from the past. Why I couldn’t shed that depression. Why I never let myself be truly happy because everything felt so fragile and temporary. I wanted you so fucking much, but I couldn’t truly keep you, and that made me angry because I was helpless.”
She swayed in my hold. “But you were taken. You were hurt.”
“I was.” I kissed her softly. “But...it’s over now. I’m back. And I’m not going anywhere.”
“I’m in awe of you, Aslan...but I don’t understand how you’re here after you were deported.”
“I’ll tell you. After. I’ll tell you everything once I’ve been inside you, made love to you, and proven to both of us this isn’t a dream we’ll wake up from. This is us. And...” I smiled against her mouth. “Considering you’re still wearing the engagement ring I gave you, I think it’s only fair we finally set a date for our wedding.”
She gasped. “Are you serious?”
“More serious than anything in my life. I want to marry you with all my fucking heart. I want us to share the same name. I want Ayla to share my name. I want...” I paused with a frown. “Hang on. What is her last name?”
“Avci,” she said quietly. “I...I legally changed mine. Everyone thought I was crazy, but a few years ago, when I was at my darkest, I filled in the paperwork and became yours, even if I belonged to a ghost.”
“Fucking hell.” I crushed her in my arms. I kissed her explicitly hard. “I love you, Nerida. So much.”
She kissed me back, panting by the time we pulled away. “So you see, we don’t technically have to get married—not that I don’t want to, of course. I do. With all my soul. But...we already share the same name. Everyone already knows I belong to you.”
I squeezed my nape. “Ah, well, that’s not technically true.”
“What?” She wrinkled her nose. “What do you mean?”
“Avci is no longer the name I’m known by.”
“You took his name?” Her face darkened. “After everything he did to you? Why the hell would you do that?”
“I didn’t have a choice.”
“What? Why?”
Pulling my new passport out of my pocket, I flicked open the photo page.
She snatched it and hissed, “Aslan Kara.”
“It was an unnegotiable requirement.”
“A requirement for what?”
“Of coming back to you.”
Sighing heavily, she tossed my passport onto her bedside table, hitting the photo of me as a baby. “I’m so confused.”
“I know.”
“I need to know, Aslan. I need to understand.”
“And I’ll tell you everything. I won’t leave out a single moment.”
Her eyes locked on mine.
I waited to see if she would demand to know everything now or...later.
Finally, she swallowed, rolled her bare shoulders, and said, “I have so many questions. I need to learn who you are now, but...I know enough that you’re still mine. Still him. Still the shipwrecked boy I fell madly in love with.” Her eyes flamed blue. “After.”
“After,” I breathed.
With a soft moan, she leaped on me.
Chapter Fifty
*
Nerida
AGE: 25 YRS OLD
*
(Love in Chinese: Ài)
HE STUMBLED AND FELL BACKWARD ON THE bed.
I’d expected him to catch me. He always caught me.
He was still the same delicious man I’d known and loved all my life. His body might be covered in silver rounded scars, but he rippled with power. His biceps bulged, his forearms ropey with veins and strength, and his stomach etched with muscles even larger than when I’d last seen him flying through the air, thanks to that awful Uber driver.
Yet his balance seemed a little off.
His mouth came down on mine, distracting me entirely as he flipped me onto my back and shoved me higher up the bed. The dynamics of him shirtless and me fully naked sent my pulse skyrocketing.
I didn’t know if Teddy and Eddie had taken Ayla to my parents for the night or if they were in their rooms, quiet as mice, giving us privacy.
Either way, I needed to be silent.
But with every touch, my breath caught and my lungs burned and the urge to cry and scream and launch into rapturous happiness only to huddle in a corner in panic had me locking my teeth together.
This is real.
He’s here.
Please, please don’t be imagining this.
Too many times I’d woken from a similar dream only to slam into reality, leaving me wet and unsatisfied, heartbroken and miserable.
