When this purpose of hers was so important.
Dearest Virgin Scribe, she was so beautiful, her brown hair pulled back to the base of her neck, her simple tunic and loose pants in green a ball gown to his eyes. She was glowing with health, her eyes sparkling—and yet warily on him, although whether that was because she couldn’t believe he was in the flesh or something else, he didn’t know.
“You’re alive,” she whispered. “I thought you were…”
“I’ve been around.”
“No one has seen you. I’ve asked… where you were.” She cleared her throat. “But I guess you’ve had things to do—”
“I had some work I had to do on myself.”
“Oh.”
He wanted to explain to her that, after his viper side had come out as it had when they’d come to save Callum and Apex, he’d known he had to understand better, and make peace with, his other half. He had to learn how it worked, and who was in charge—so he was sure that people he cared about were safe.
Given the power of that bite, he had to protect those around him who mattered.
Especially… her.
“And how did the work go,” she asked.
“Good. Very good.” He thought back to Callum telling him he didn’t need a weapon. The male had been so very right. “I’m really good.”
“Well. I’m glad.”
“You’ve been working hard, too.” He glanced around at the prisoners’ berths. “You’re… doing what you’re made to do.”
“I think so.”
There was a long silence, and then he rushed the story out, talking faster and faster, as if she wouldn’t listen to him for longer than a minute or two: “Cordelhia was in on the plot to frame me. I just want you to know that. She knew what her brother planned and it was to get rid of her twin who was, in their eyes, a disgrace to their bloodline. They solved a problem that was no fault of that sister’s by killing her and sending me to prison for two centuries. I’m telling you this not so you feel sorry for me, but so you know that there is no way I’m ever going back to Cordelhia. Ever. I was in love with an illusion set up and reinforced by the class I was in. I excused her behavior, which was abouttolerating me, rather than wanting to be with me, at the altar of the modesty a female of worth was supposed to have. I do not love Cordelhia, I never truly did, and I never, ever will forgive her.”
Nadya’s eyes seemed to get wider and wider as he went along, and then as he paused for a breath, his name came out of her in a way that could have meant anything.
“Kane…?” As if she couldn’t believe it, and not because she didn’t believe the story.
“You don’t have to be with me,” he said. “But what I can’t bear is the idea you think I ever betrayed you or used you. What we had was precious and important, and it was every bit the resurrection I needed. You were never an illusion to me. You were always real. And it has nothing to do with how I started as your patient, and everything to do with who you are as a female, as a healer, as… the one that I love with all my heart.”
Tears filled her eyes and she clasped the little pebble he’d left her tonight to her chest. “Kane.”
He put his palms out to reassure her. “I’m not asking for anything. I just needed you to know how I f—”
Nadya burst up from her seat and all but jumped over the table she worked at. The next thing he knew, she was in his arms and kissing him.
“I’m sorry,” she said against his mouth. “I didn’t know—”
“Neither did I—”
“—about what had happened—”
“Don’t apologize, I understand how you felt—”
“And I love you, too.”
That stopped everything. But only for a moment. “You do…?”
“Yes,” she breathed. “I love you, I love you, I love you, do you want me to say it some more? And I’m sorry I doubted you. I had my own things to deal with from my past and—”
“Shh,” he said as he dropped his mouth back down to hers. “All is forgiven. I understand completely.”