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‘What are you doing here?’
Zeph knew poets wrote reams about this place, and, while the rolling mountains were decent enough, in his eyes the woman standing in front of him was the most beautiful sight he’d ever seen.
The russet hair that had gained highlights during their time on the yacht glinted beneath the Highland sun, and her face glowed with health and beauty. Did it disgruntle him a little that she looked so spectacular when he was suffering? Maybe. But he deserved that too.
‘I could ask you the same question. Why here?’
She shrugged her despondency, leaving him a fraction more desolate, a feat he wouldn’t have believed was possible before it happened. ‘I don’t have a company any more so I’m thinking of becoming a sheep farmer. What do you care?’
He sucked in a long breath. ‘Did you think placing an infuriating number of mountains between us was going to stop me coming after you?’
‘I don’t care. Just...please, go away.’
The sliver of desperation in her voice triggered another spark in him. Because he recognised it as his own, multiplied by a million. But her desperation didn’t mean she was experiencing similar feelings. Perhaps it was because he’d burned every last component in the bridge leading back to her.
‘How did you even find me?’ she cried when she realised he wasn’t going to budge.
Did she know he was incapable of it? Taking a step away from her would end him. ‘I used every resource I had at my disposal and I don’t apologise for it.’
She opened her mouth to condemn him some more.
But he hurried to speak before she could. ‘I had to find you,agape mou.’ He shook his head. ‘I fought an ocean and survived but I’ve come to realise that I won’t survive you not taking me back, Imogen.Parakalo.Please hear me out?’ There was that infuriating crack in his voice again.
Out here in this frigid middle of nowhere for the sheep to hear. They bleated their indifference as his wife’s eyes widened.
She’d heard it too no doubt. Was readying to send him away for the fool he was.
His breath tangled in his lungs when she took a step. But it wasn’t away from him, it was towards him.
His hands shook at his sides, every fibre of his being fighting to remain still and not reach out for her.
‘No. Please go away,’ she repeated. ‘I don’t want you here.’
His heart lurched but he bounced back almost immediately. ‘I don’t want to be here either.’
She stiffened, her nose tilting upward in that affronted way that made him want to sweep her into his arms. ‘You shouldn’t have sent your pilot away, then. No matter, the road to town is that way.’ She pointed over his shoulder.
‘I don’t want to be here because I want us both back on that yacht with nothing between us but laughter. And conversation. And sex.’
Her eyes clung for a moment before dismissing him again. ‘That was a dream. A few weeks suspended in time until the real you came back. Remember?’
He flinched. ‘The real me.’ He laughed. ‘I don’t know who or what that is any more.’
She hesitated and he snatched at the opportunity.
‘How can I still be the man hell-bent on revenge when without you I would still be lost?’
Imogen shook her head. ‘You would’ve regained your memories eventually. It was only a matter of—’
‘I don’t mean my lost memories, Imogen. I mean myself. The man I am here.’ He thumped at his heart. ‘You showed me who I was without me even knowing I was on a journey of discovery. You opened my eyes to better, far better than I’d ever known,agape mou.’
She nodded wretchedly. ‘Oh, yes. I did all of that. And you still threw me away. So easily.’
His throat closed and he had to swallow several times before he could speak. ‘I was terrified how much I craved you. All my life I’ve relied on no one but myself. The family I loved was taken from me in the blink of an eye. I had to learn to exist as a lone wolf. I held you at arm’s length when we married because I didn’t know any other way to exist. I’ve lived with loneliness and anger for so long, I couldn’t separate the fact that your father and grandfather were the ones responsible, not every Callahan that lived and breathed.’
He gritted his teeth, despising himself but unable to stop confessing the truth. ‘Maybe I picked you to fulfil that agreement because I was envious that you’d had a family when I’d not. It was wrong but I wanted you to have a...taster of what I went through. And then you came and reclaimed me in that church. I suddenly...belonged to someone. I was falling in love with someone. I was no longer alone. It felt incredible. And far too good to be true. So I pushed it away. I pushed you away. For that, I will always regret it and beg your forgiveness.’
Her mouth dropped open. ‘Y-you’re in love with...me?’
