She swallowed deeply and finally took a hesitant step toward him even as he walked toward her. She watched him come, noticing the slight limp that was at odds with that proud military bearing she remembered and wondering at it. Anxiously she twisted her ring around her finger. Hero’s wedding ring. A symbol of the unexpected love that found and ensnared them.
But it wasn’therlove, she mentally repeated the words that had become her mantra. It had been theirs. Hero’s and Ian’s.
What she’d had was a glimpse, a taste. She needed to remember that, but it was so very difficult when her Ian was standing in front of her. “When I saw you, I thought I’d finally truly lost it. I saw you and I saw all the wishful thinking, all the insanity of the past couple months there. When I left Dùn Cuilean after the auction, I was determined to let it go. To let Ian go.”
“To let me go.”
“No.Ian.” The fervid refrain singing in her ears. “You are nothim. Ian is long dead.” Mikah’s throat tightened around the word. Through all of this, she’d never said that so blatantly before. Ian had been gone, taken, lost, but never dead.
It hurt like hell to say it aloud.
She tore away from his gaze, crossing to the windows that overlooked Lake Michigan. Pushing open a window, she welcomed the rush of winter air. It lifted her hair, cooled her flaming cheeks, and dried the tears that sprang to her eyes.Ian.
She felt him behind her, felt the familiar heat of his body against hers. Felt his hands slide around her waist and turn her until her body was pressed against his. Felt his heart beat against her cheek, his lips brush against her ear. “Don’t cry, my love. I am here.”
Oh, she wanted him to be.
Just the feel of him against her was achingly dear. Her arms slid around his waist and curled up his back as his came around her to pull her trembling body close. He felt the same as she remembered and different at the same time. Stronger, more muscular beneath his tailored dress shirt and sport coat. So was she, and yet her body still fit against him just so. He lifted her hand from his chest, raising it to his lips.
It was a gentle kiss he placed there, but then he moved her hand back and forth across his lips. A caress that sparked a remembrance. When he pressed another kiss to her palm, Mikah shuddered helplessly, remembering when Ian had done the very same that day by the pagoda. Looks were one thing. Words, another. But actions?
She clutched him to her. In turn, his arms were binding her so tightly to him that she could scarcely breathe. She didn’t care. The chemistry was there, his heart beating against hers so comfortably. He even smelled so right. “Ian?”
“Aye, Hero. I’m here.”
She tilted her head back to look at him, caught the light of love burning in his chocolate gaze, and then his lips captured hers in a tender kiss, full of longing. With sudden joy, Mikah returned his kiss. Heat flared between them. The heat of passion, of love, and of rediscovery.
She smoothed a hand over his chest, and his hand came up to cover hers. He caressed gently and paused, fingering the ring she wore. He pulled away and looked down at her hand.
“Where did you get this?”
She started at the hoarsely spoken words. She could hear his wonder. Feel his emotion at the sight of the ring that had so briefly bound them.
“It was right where we…theyleft it.” Those words, her hesitation and alteration of those words, brought Mikah back to reality. What had she been thinking? That this Jason—Jace—could somehow fill the gap Ian left in her heart? Nothing had changed.
She drew away from him in horror. “I think you should go.”
He frowned, clearly puzzled by her sudden chill. “Go?”
“Leave.”
She went to the door and opened it, pointing to the hallway.
“Hero…”
“I’m not Hero!” she exploded. Her hands fisted at her sides as she stared at him. “She’s dead. They are both dead! This,”—she wrenched the ring from her finger and stared down at the sparkling emerald—“This is just a fantasy. Someone else’s reality, and I won’t be sucked back into it again.” She threw it at him and he caught it, his fingers curling around it. “Now go!”
Mikah buried her face in her hands and again felt rather than heard him approach. The heat of his body neared and warmed. In spite of her shaky resolve, she couldn’t help but shiver.
He walked past her, and part of her cried out not to let him go, but she knew that she had to do what was best. And what was best was not to fall back into the despondency that had beckoned to her for the past three months. The door closed, and a moment later, warm hands encircled her wrists and she almost sobbed in relief…or in defeat. She wasn’t certain which one.
Forcing her hands down, he spoke softly. “Look at me, my love.”
The command was such a gentle one Mikah could not deny him. She opened her eyes and met his familiar dark gaze. That chocolaty warmth was still there. So like Ian, his eyes, his kindness, and unfortunately, his determination. A tear slid down her cheek.
“Why do you deny it?” His brogue was low and husky but there was pain beneath it. Pain that was on par with her own. “I am Ian Conagham as surely as you are Hero, his wife.”
She didn’t dare agree with that. As much as she had fantasized of a moment like this, as much as it would be so easy to do, she wasn’t Hero any more than this man was the Ian she had known and loved. They were different people with different pasts, different interests. If they were to do this only to be disappointed in those differences, her heart would be broken all over again. She didn’t want that. Couldn’t bear that. It’d taken her three months to accept the truth. Ian, her Ian, was dead and buried.
