She summoned a sigh, pulled from mountain peaks on the opposite side of the earth, and accepted his gift. “I don’t need anything—nothing in this crazy, messy, beautiful, old world—but you. Oh, I’ll have you, Jonas Rishel. I’ll have you, and I’ll never let you go.” A rainbow of joy shimmered across his face, then dissipated quick as morning fog.

With a leaden breath, he inclined his head and touched his brow to hers. “My life is not simple. Ironically. And you know how I am bound.”

For a life with him, she’d weather any complication—outlast any bond. Steadying trembling knees, she brushed her lips over his forehead. “I know.”

He gathered together her hands and lifted them to his heart. “I swear to you—I will leave this place. I will walk away and never look back, if you’ll go with me.”

She met his gaze. It was unflinching and true as the North Star.

“I’ve had a fire inside since I was a child, but I could never leave. Never until now—until you. I love you.” He drew her into his arms again.

The borrowed shirt parted at her throat, allowing a tantalizing taste of skin on skin. His flesh burned like an ember, igniting an answering spark in her core. “I love you.” Running her lips along his collarbone, she breathed the words into his skin. “I love you, I love you, I love you.”

“Come away with me.”

The words welled with longing deep and wide. Her shoulders tightened. “I want to…but…” She caught her bottom lip between her teeth. To summon them into the sacred space she and Jonas created felt wrong somehow, but she had no choice. She forced herself to back away a half step. “What about Rebecca? Nora?” His eyes deepened to ocean blue. His jaw hardened like a boulder on a shoreline he’d never seen.

“I will not abandon that child.”

His voice was as level as hers had been trembly. Swallowing against the lump in her throat, she nodded.

“I will hold her in my heart and do everything in my power to care for her and her mother. Rebecca will understand my leaving far better than you know. I’m confident she’ll join us someday. But I do us all a disservice by staying. I have to go. I have to believe all will be well.”

“You have to have faith,” she whispered.

“Faith.” Tears shimmered on his lower lids.

She embraced him with all the strength she had. “Jonas Rishel, you are a good man.” Holding his hand, she followed him up the stairs to his bedroom.

One by one, he pulled each shade.