He nodded.
A small laugh wobbled out of me. “It was averyexpensive necklace.”
He winced. “I know. Did you read the letter?”
I nodded.
“I mean it, Abigail.” His eyes were steady and focused on mine. “You said we shouldn’t make our grandparents’ mistakes. So let’s not.”
“Okay.”
“I shouldn’t have kept the necklace a secret; I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have tried to keep you from researching your family’s past. I...” He paused, a look of confusion on his face as my words caught up with him. “Wait, okay?”
I started grinning. “Yes. Okay. I overreacted. I get it, they’re your family.”
“So—you—we’re—”
I grinned harder, my chest so warm and full I felt like I’d swallowed the sun. “Yes.”
He let out a blazing laugh and shook his head and very deliberately held my gaze. “I should have fought for you.”
“You did. I did. Did you get my letter?”
He looked confused. “Your letter?”
A surprised laugh jolted out of me. “You’ll get it soon.”
“What did it say?”
I took a step closer and hesitantly raised my hand to tame one of his flyaway curls. “It sort of said what your letter said. Brilliant minds and all that. And I’m sorry I told you I’d rather be miserable than be with you.”
A smile started spreading over his face. “Yeah, you were pretty cold.”
“I’m sorry.” I wanted to launch myself into his arms, to hug him sotightly every line of our body fit together, but even now I was being slightly cautious. In his letter, he’d said... but I needed to hear it out loud. I needed to hear it two times, three times. “I don’t want to be miserable. I—I have been miserable.”
“You have?”
I made a strangled noise. “Of course I have.”
“Really?”
“How can you be surprised?”
“I wasn’t sure! You’resogood at walking away. You sounded so rational.”
“I wasn’t being rational! I was trying to protect myself. It’shardto let someone in. It gives them the power to hurt you.”
“True.” He swallowed and stepped forward. “I want to let you in, Abigail Schoenberg. I love you.”
I pulled in a breath. He was so vulnerable, standing there, all his walls down, the layers peeled back, soul bared and helpless. Noah Barbanel was proud and determined and protective to a fault, and he didn’t like to show weakness—and he’d done so anyway. He’d decided to do this, to come after me, to say we were worth it. To fight for us. To choose us.
I chose us, too.
I chose to be with Noah Barbanel, who I was in love with, who made me happy. I chose delight and butterflies and incandescent joy, and I could have this, this good, wonderful thing. I could fling myself off the cliff with utter abandon. I wanted Noah Barbanel. I wantedusand so did he. “I love you, too, Noah Barbanel.”
His head jerked up, his eyes wide. “You don’t have to say that.”
“I know. But I do. Love you. And,” I said, my own smile breaking as his broke over his face, “you make me want to be better, too. AndI will be. I won’t run away. Or—I’ll come back, if I run. I think I’m always going to want to come back to you.”
