It really was.
Amira’s cairn sat nestled in the curve of a crescent-shaped pond. All around it, a field of lush green speckled with yellow, white, and pink wildflowers sprawled in a thick carpet. In the distance, a purple ridge of mountains ran like the ruffled edge of a well-loved gown.
The cairn itself was small, but every stone was expertly hewn. Someone had chosen blue-green, veined granite that sparkled in the sunlight. Moss, grass, and flowers had crept over the lowest stones and found purchase in the gaps, blending it seamlessly into the environment — exactly as his environmentally conscious architect mother would have wanted it.
An unexpected wave of grief nearly rocked him back on his heels.
His vision blurred, smearing the gorgeous view and the lovingly constructed cairn until it was little more than a smudge of green and brown and gray.
All at once, the injustice of his mother’s life crashed down on him — or rather, it rose up out of the depths where he’d hidden it. Raw emotion came in terrible flashes: rage, grief, longing, affection, understanding, recrimination.
The weight of it all would have crushed him to dust if Atria hadn’t been there.
As quickly as they overwhelmed him, he felt the pain and confusion begin to ebb. Kaz thought he could always tell when his mate worked her magic on him. It was not because the raw feelings suddenly vanished, but rather because they were simply made less heavy. Atria did not strip him of his grief. She shouldered it with him.
That was the only reason he found the strength to walk down the hill with Frances and Tosun. Knowing his mate was looking on from the rise, her heart with him, pushed him to close the distance between himself and the stone that marked his mother’s final resting place.
He stood there with his grandparents for some time, wordless.
Eventually, he sank down to one knee before the cairn. Resting just the tips of his fingers on the nearest, moss-covered stone, he thought,Hi, Mama. I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to get here.
The sounds of fabric rustling was barely audible over thewhushof wind through the grass. A moment later, Tosun sank onto his knees beside him. Frances followed suit. Together, they touched the stones and silently reached out to a woman long gone.
“I’m sorry,” he rasped. “I know that I’ve been a bad son, a disappointment of a grandson. I tried to be what she wanted and I failed. But I loved her. I promise I loved her.”
A rough hand clasped the back of his neck. Tosun dragged him into his side and said in a gruff voice, “Stop that now. Your mother wouldn’t want you to think of yourself that way, Kazimier. Don’t disrespect her memory by thinking she would be disappointed in the man you’ve become.”
Frances sucked in a large breath and then said, with her usual bluntness, “Do you love your family?”
Kaz swallowed. “Most days.”
“Do you protect people weaker than you?”
“I try to.”
“Do you love your mate?”
“Yes.”
Frances shot him a flat look. “Then I don’t know what you think we’d have to be disappointed about, boy.”
Against his will, he found himself leaning into his grandfather, whose warmth radiated through layers of flannel and denim. When he spoke next, his voice broke, “I killed her.”
Tosun’s fingers flexed at the same time that Frances’s head whipped toward Kaz. “What are you talking about?” she demanded, voice as harsh as stone scraping against itself.
Kaz’s throat constricted so painfully, he almost couldn’t get the words out. “If I hadn’t been born, Thaddeus might have— he might have eventually made the choice to stay with her. He wouldn’t have murdered Raina and tried to kill Teddy and Sam. He would still be alive. Raina and Amira would still be alive. It was me that— I pushed him over the edge. I’m the reason they’re all gone.”
Frances snorted. “Bullshit.”
Tosun squeezed the back of Kaz’s neck. In an equally fierce tone, he agreed,“Bullshit.”
“Your father was a textbook sociopath,” his grandfather continued. “Your mother knew it. His spouse knew it. Even his twin brother knew it. Amira hid him from us until she found out she was pregnant because she knew what kind of man he was — and that he’d never willingly leave his spouse because that meant giving up power over someone weaker than him.”
Frances gripped Kaz’s arm hard enough to bruise when she added, “He killed Raina and he tried to kill his sons because that’s what men who can’t give up powerdo.They hurt people because it’s the easy way out. Amiraneverblamed you. She only ever blamed herself for what happened to Raina.”
Kaz blinked back hot tears. “Then why couldn’t shelookat me?”
“I asked her the same thing,” Frances admitted, voice thick. “When you were born and she said she was giving you over to Delilah, I was so angry with her— How could she? That was her boy. You wereourboy. For fuck’s sake, welovedyou the second you were born. Even before that. Didn’t give two shits who your dad was. After everything, how could she give you up? I’ll never forget the way she looked at me over the dinner table and said, ‘Because it’s what I deserve.’”
