“I see.” She turned for the bedroom. “Thank you.”
She all but ran through the door, shutting it behind her and leaning back against the wood.
A tear fell.
And then two.
It was simply . . . too much.
Too much love, too much longing and joy andeverythingto contain.
But . . .
Oof!
No morebuts.
No more prevarication and wavering.
Isla Kinsey loved Tavish Balfour. Full stop.
Just as he loved her.
They were woven into the very fabric of one another’s souls.
How dare the man she loved not fight for his soul?
She wiped her eyes on the sleeve of her dressing gown and then met her gaze in the mirror of the small vanity.
Huh.
She appeared as undone as she felt—eyes wide, color high on her cheeks, lips still red and bee-stung from Tavish’s kisses.
So this is what love looks like, she thought.True love.
Not a fanciful sort of passion or an inclination. Not a pleasant attachment formed from unity of thought and purpose. Not even the wild infatuation of a young girl lost in the heady delight of her first romance.
No.
This was an I-will-burn-for-you-until-the-day-I-die sort of devotion. A love that reshaped empires and incited wars and shattered two centuries of animosity between a pair of feuding families.
And between one breath and the next, Isla simply . . . knew.
The mere thought of living without him tasted of ash.
She could no more untangle the knot that bound her to Tavish Balfour than she could willfully stop her own beating heart.
Nothing else mattered beyond that. Any life she lived away from him would pale in comparison.
As he had said, he was hers.
And she was his.
Tavish tried toput some semblance of a lunch together.
But it was hard going.
His hand shook as he sliced the ham, leaving the cuts uneven. He didn’t dare attempt the bread.
