And that?
That changes everything.
“We could have wanted each other,” he murmurs, taking in a tight breath that presses against my back. “You…could have been the gift I was searching for, the gift that showed me I hadn’t been abandoned.”
My muscles weaken until I can’t hold the sword up any longer. It drops, point hitting the ground before the rest clatters after. Turning, I throw my arms around Samson, crushing him as tight as I can. His arms, wrapped around me, hold together.
Somewhere, beyond us, Yami and Tsuki play in the cavern, sniffing out unusual smells, tackling unusual bugs, but for spare moments, my entire world consists of loving arms.
Samson accepts me.
Wholly.
Even my weakest, ugliest parts are beautiful to him. The parts I hate. The parts I thought I left behind.
He thinks they’re a gift.
We could have wanted each other.
“Thank you,” I whisper, and my voice cracks. “For…everything.Thank you.”
He buries my body in his, threading his fingers into my hair. Voice harsh with withheld tears, he whispers, “I love you, Citrus. No matter what you look like or who you see when you look in a mirror, I loveyou.”
My heart leaps, and my lungs fill with the scent of him. Earthen. Warm.Safe. Tears bead in my eyes, and if they were open, my glasses would probably be fogged. Hoarse, I say, “I love you, too, Samson. So much. If I— If I’d been born here, if we’d met sooner…” I wouldn’t have talked to him. I would have been unfamiliar and afraid, just like I was in my other world. I want to believe things would have been magically different…but I know myself better.
Inside, I’m scared and searching. Weneededthe separation before we could ever wind up together.
Who knows if I would have even lifted my head high enough to see his glorious shoulders if ever our paths had crossed.
“It’s okay,” he says. “I grew up guarded, too. I’m not saying we would have intrinsically known we belonged with each other had we met when we were younger. I’m saying, knowing what I do now, I would have given anything for someone like you. Knowing what you do now, I hope you would have wanted me, too.”
“I would have.” I ball my fists in his clothes. “Completely.”
I don’t know how long we stay like that—soaking in one another—but I know when I come up for air, I am forever changed.
And when I bend to get my sword…I see Citrus in the blade.
Chapter 33
♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥
Sam and Sam.
“Where are you sneaking off to,Samantha?”
A shiver runs all the way up my spine as Samson’s voice trickles into my ear. His arm, circled around my waist, reels me in against his chest, keeping me solidly against him and too far from the front door.
“It’searly. Before eight, even,” he notes.
I release the doorknob. “I thought you were outside, milking the cows.”
“I was.” He kisses my temple. “Now I’m not. Where are you heading, Samantha?”
Flushing, I regret having revealed that particular moniker shortly after we made Verity’s Edge together. My nerves as we left the mine that day resulted in a bout of my incurable oversharing. So now Samson knows things he never ever should have. “Please stop using my government name.”
“Why? I like it. Samson,Samantha. We’re both Sammys.” He’s grinning big when I scowl back at him. “It’s my favorite thing.”
I jut my lip. “I hadn’t noticed.”
