Page 45 of Sanctuary

“Okay.” He appears to be hiding a smile. “I was afraid you’d suspect I’d grabbed the wine and taken off, leaving you behind.”

I swallow hard and don’t answer.

He stops walking and turns me to face him, lifting my chin with his gloved hand. “Did you think that?”

I stare up at him. Have no idea how to answer. Claiming I did feels safer, but it’s also an absolute lie.

I’m more anxious than ever. Almost shaking with it. It feels like something very important is happening here, and I want it and fear it at the exact same time.

“Breanna?” Aidan prompts thickly.

I tighten my lips and give my head a little shake, dropping my eyes.

I can’t remember the last time I was this scared. Not even when my life has been in danger have I felt likethis.

“If you thought I’d left you, you’d be heading down the mountain and not up it,” he murmurs, working out the answer for himself. “So that means you really were coming to save me.”

With a brief glint of annoyance, I jerk my chin out of his hand. “That’s what I told you from the beginning.”

“But you made it into a joke. It was real. You were actually worried about me.”

“Do you think I wanted something to happen to you?”

“A week ago, I’m pretty sure you wouldn’t have blinked if I got wiped off the face of the earth.”

I frown. “I would have blinked.”

“Maybe. But you wouldn’t have minded too much.”

“So what’s your point? You wouldn’t have minded if something happened to me.”

“Yes, I would have. I was always far too consumed with where you were and what you were doing.”

“You can’t retcon our history like that. You never cared about me at all except to resent me.”

“I did resent you,” he admits, still far more serious than I’m comfortable with but also almost amused. “You drove me absolutely crazy. And I kept trying to convince myself it wasbecause you were stealing my jobs and taking my territory, but it was always more than that. I couldn’t stop thinking about you. I’d be trying to live my life as I always did, and I’d randomly get hit by images of you. Or I’d start wondering about how you were doing. Why you did what you did. I had this ridiculous, desperate need toknowyou. All of you.”

I gulp. My cheeks are burning, and not only from the evening air. “You’re exaggerating.”

“No, I’m not. Think about it. Everything you ever said about this territory being more than large enough for the two of us was absolutely true. So why the hell would I have fought you so hard?”

“I… I never understood it. I know I had my own issues. I could never back down with you and be reasonable, even when you were trying to negotiate. But I could never understand why it was so important to you.”

“I didn’t want to understand. I instinctively knew you were some kind of threat to me, but I couldn’t admit you were a threat to my heart. Not my work.”

“Aidan.” The shuddering inside me has radiated out so that my fingers are trembling, and my lips are wobbling.

“It’s fine, love. You’ve hated me for a long time, and our hearts don’t shift on a dime. It’s enough that you were worried about me. That you knew I hadn’t left you. I take that as a very encouraging sign.”

No one has ever looked at me the way Aidan is gazing down at me now. With eyes filled with feeling. Warm and tender and still slightly amused. Full of hope. Something resembling devotion.

And awe.

Awe.

Like he can’t believe I’m with him.

I have to answer it. I must. But I’m still far too frightened and confused to express anything close to what he’s expressed to me.

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