Page 114 of Season Warriors & Wolves

He returned after his bath, water rivulets still clinging to his skin as he dried his hair with a towel. He caught me looking, and when he smiled at me, I wanted to give up right then.

“What is it about?” he asked, laying on his side of the bed and I blinked at him. He pointed a finger on the page. “The book.”

“Nothing that would be interesting to you,” I said, flipping a page. Truly. It wasn’t interesting for me either. Where had I found this absolute nonsense about gut health?

It felt like I’d stabbed at my own heart when his brows creased. “I see.”

We were silent for what felt like hours. I’d stolen glances from time to time, but his gaze had never left a tiny spot on my glittery ceiling filled with countless stones that turned a luminescent silver when hit by darkness of night.

Too tired to continue this day, I shut my book, blew the bunch of candles on my nightstand and laid down, forcing my blood shot eyes shut.

His voice was smoother than night, “Can I at least hold you?”

Yes. Yes. Yes. I rolled round and let him wrap his arm around me. Heaven—I was in heaven. Lemon scented heaven.

His fingers were gentle on my back. “Thank you. Will you tell me goodnight as well?”

“Good night.”

“What about a kiss?”

I pressed my lips to his for a moment and then ducked my head back to my hiding spot in his chest.

Silence rang for a short while. “Please forgive me,” he murmured between my hair. “I was selfish, I know. But I swear it to you, my heart, I’ve rarely ever been selfish before you were in my life. Can’t I be selfish with you? Hm?”

When his voice shook, the heartache returned so fiercely it was making me dizzy. I had forced Cai and Nia to accept my eventual death, schooled them to let me face it as I wish. But him…he would never. How had I just realised that?

I trailed a hand down his back and sneaked it under his shirt, feeling his warm skin on my cold one. He sighed at my touch, and I shuffled closer to him, slipping a leg between his and adjusting my face on his chest. I felt the still angry scars on his chest brush my cheek and remembered the moment I had wanted to be selfish for him, too. I would have wasted that wish a million more times to have him back. I would have wasted any wish in this realm to have him with me.

“I’m scared, Kil. So scared. Like never before.”

There it all was.

I didn’t fear dying. I feared failing them.

He suddenly pulled back and kissed me, ravenously—inhaling my every breath till his own filled my lungs. “I am so scared, too, Snow. Terrified. But I'm more scared of losing you. If I had found you dead, nothing would have mattered in this world enough for me to stay in it. I won’t lose you again for the sake of nothing. You hear me? For the sake of absolutely nothing. Fuck the world.”

My mouth dropped open. “Kilian Castemont.”

“You heard me,” he said, pulling me close to him again and burying his head on the crook of my neck. “Hold me, woman, and hold me tight. Damn nearly had me thrown into a panicking fit that day.”

I scratched my fingers through his scalp, letting his incredibly silky hair slide between my fingers. “Poor baby.”

A squeak left my mouth when he bit my neck. “Evil woman.”

“But you love me,” I whispered, half giggling.

He left a dozen pecks on my shoulder. “So much it terrifies me. If you hadn’t taken my hand—”

“I will always take your hand.”

“You hesitated.”

“If there is a world where you are safe in it, I would have given everything. Even my life.” I will, still.

“Don’t break my heart, Snow.”

“I already warned you, darling. Long ago.”