“I thought that I loved her,” he confessed. “I believed it at the time. But how could I love someone that I didn’t know?”

“Then, why?”

“Can’t you see why?”

She tilted her head in confusion. She’d been certain that she knew why he hadn’t answered. Now, as his mask finally fell away, she wondered if she had been perfectly, horribly wrong.

“I…”

“It was you, Kerrigan,” he said, closing the distance between them. “It was always you.”

“Me?” she could barely get out.

“I know you. All of you.” He stroked one of her red curls out of her face and tucked a wet strand behind her ear. Her heart thrummed wild in her chest. “I have tried to resist wanting you and failed time and time again. I did not answer the question because I was not prepared to tell you that I loved you for the first time in front of an audience.”

Her gasp was nearly silent. She reached out with trembling hands and cupped his cheek. “You… love me?”

“With all of my heart.”

He drew in a step closer until their bodies were nearly touching. His lips hovered over hers. She could barely breathe as his hand slipped from her slightly pointed ear down to the hollow of her throat and across her collarbone. He continued his descent along her arm, to her waist, and landed on her hip. Then, he dragged her that last step forward, skin to skin. She hitched a breath, in shock at the feel of all of him pressed hard against her stomach. Her eyes widened as her hands came to brace against his chest.

It had been one thing the game they had played in the greenhouse. It had gotten too far. They had been drunk on faerie punch. It had been amazing, but not enough. Never enough. This was so so much more than that.

“I want this,” he told her. “And I’m terrified I’ll lose you.”

“You won’t lose me.”

“You don’t know that. You’re engaged to someone else. We’re both in mortal danger quite frequently.”

“I’m breaking off the engagement tomorrow,” she assured him. “And if we’re already going to be in danger, then we should enjoy what we have while we have it.”

He pressed a finger to her lips. “Don’t say that. I never want to rush with you. To take what we can in scraps of moments.”

She took his finger from her lips, pressing a soft kiss to the tip. “If we don’t take our moments, someone else will take them from us. You love me, Fordham. I love you. You want this. I want this.” She drew his head down to hers, just a breath between their lips. “Please.”