He didn’t know what to do with that.
Her expression softened as she watched him struggle for words he didn’t have. “Gunnar,” she whispered, voice threaded with something he didn’t dare trust. “Say something.”
He tried. But everything inside him had seized—hope, fear, disbelief tangling into one impossible knot.
“Wren.” His voice was low, rough enough that it startled even him. “You don’t understand what you’re claiming. What this means.”
“Then explain it to me,” she said, stepping closer. “Let me understand.”
Her body brushed his—soft warmth meeting stone—for one breath, one heartbeat. His hands curled at his sides, knuckles whitening as he fought the instinct to reach for her. Claim her. Pull her into his arms and hold her there until the storm outside gave up trying to touch her.
“You say you were drawn here,” he murmured, forcing the words out. “You say you saw something. Someone.” Heswallowed hard. “But if fate has claimed you, Wren, then you don’t just step into my world. You become bound to it. Bound to me.”
Her breath caught, but not with fear. With something he didn’t recognize. Something warmer.
“I know,” she whispered. “It should scare me. But it doesn’t.”
His pulse slammed.
For centuries he’d trained himself not to hope. Hope was deadly for trolls. Hope turned to longing, longing to madness. But the way she looked at him now—with certainty, with hunger, with an affection that bordered on reverence—broke through every wall he’d built.
“You should be afraid,” he said, though his voice had lost that iron certainty. “Of what I am. Of what I could become. Of what it means for you.”
She shook her head slowly, deliberately. “I’m not afraid of you.”
The words settled under his skin like they belonged there.
Then she touched him.
Her fingers brushed his forearm, light as breath yet electrifying enough that his entire body went rigid. She traced up to his elbow, his biceps, the place where muscle and darkness met warmth and something frighteningly like tenderness.
His breath hissed through his teeth.
“You say I don’t understand,” she murmured, stepping into his space again. “So teach me. Tell me what it means. Show me who you are.”
Gods above and below, she had no idea what she was asking. Or worse, maybe she did.
He should have stepped away. He should have pushed her back, told her she was saying these things because she was cold, grateful, overwhelmed by the storm.
But Gunnar had never been a good liar. Especially not to himself.
“Wren,” he said again, her name cracking under the weight of everything he couldn’t say.
She rose onto her toes, her breath warm against his throat.
“Gunnar,” she whispered back, mirroring him, undoing him.
A low, involuntary growl vibrated through his chest. She smiled as if she’d been waiting to hear that sound. And without breaking eye contact, she slipped her hand down his arm, laced her fingers with his, and tugged. Not hard. Not demanding. But with intention. Inviting him to come closer to temptation. To her.
She drew him toward the bed. His feet moved before he realized he’d made the decision. His hand tightened around hers—large, calloused, careful—as if he feared the world might snatch her away if he didn’t hold on.
“Wren,” he tried once more, his voice thick and raw, “if we cross this line, I may not be able to let you go.”
She pulled his shirt over her head and tossed it aside, standing in front of him, completely bare. Then she stepped back onto the furs, pulling him closer, eyes lit with something fierce and bright and devastatingly sure.
“Good,” she whispered. “I don’t want you to.”
Every last restraint he had shattered.
