Page 133 of Hollow Court

It felt right. A carefully reasoned decision wherein I weighed the risks of taking a chance on him against the reality of letting him go, and knew the latter was never really an option at all.

He was in the massive wing-backed chair again, his obsidian locks still wet from the bath and falling artfully across his forehead.

I didn’t knock this time before I eased open his balcony door. He glanced over at me, his expression guarded.

“You were right, too,” I said as soon as I closed the door.

“About what?” His voice was rougher than usual, not quite as teasing, as he took me in.

“All of it,” I admitted, shrugging one shoulder. “I should have stayed to hear you out. I didn’t know what I wanted, and I was utterly unprepared for what I was getting into when I showed up at your door that night. It was the first time in my life I didn’t bother to think something through.”

“You said you wanted to take it for yourself,” he reminded me quietly.

I had said that, but had it been entirely true?

“Not it,” I corrected. “You. I had never wanted to choose anything for myself the way I wanted to choose you, but it still felt like it was impossible when it meant betraying my entire family in the process. I thought… I don’t know what I thought. That we could have that night for ourselves and walk away from it?”

It sounded ridiculous now.

“Is that why you left so quickly the next morning?” He asked like he already knew the answer, but I expounded anyway.

“I was trying to get perspective. I didn’t know… I thought maybe…it was always like that.” A flush rose to my cheeks as I tried, badly, to explain that I hadn’t understood the way that night would change everything.

Davin’s eyes darkened, tugging at something low in my abdomen. “It isn’t.”

“I know that now.” My voice was barely above a whisper.

And I did know.

Whatever magic had been there with Davin had been entirely absent in the single night I spent in a man’s company after that, but hearing him confirm that it was the same for him was like having a bandage put on a wound I didn’t know was still bleeding.

“And honestly,” I went on, “I wasn’t sure what you wanted. I’m not the only one with a…resting Socairan face. But it was never just a bit of fun for me.”

A ghost of a smirk crossed Davin’s mouth before he was serious once more.

“We made a mess of things,” he said.

“We did,” I agreed. “And we’ve run in circles ever since. But I don’t want to keep living in those mistakes.”

I stepped closer to him until I was standing between his knees.

He looked up at me, his cerulean gaze equal parts wariness and hope. “You’ll stay?”

I didn’t know if he meant tonight or forever, but my answer was the same. “I’ll stay.”

FORTY-FOUR

Davin

I’ll stay.

Galina’s hands came to tentatively rest on my shoulders, her face leaning down until she was so close, I could feel her breath on my lips.

I was terrified to move, to break whatever spell we were under.

It seemed impossible that after everything, she was here, telling me she would put the past behind us, but I damned sure wasn’t going to waste it.

So I placed my hands gently on her waist, pulling her closer to me until her lips met mine. When I kissed her on the rooftop, it had been impulsive, driven by need and want and jealousy.