“It is the only one I have.”
Fiona stared at him, disbelief and fury rising together.
“You cannot simply decide this for both of us.”
“I am trying to protect you.”
“By breaking my heart?”
He flinched.
Silence fell between them again, broken only by the distant crash of waves against the rocks below.
At last, Christian spoke, his voice quieter than before.
“Perhaps I was foolish to believe that someone like me could build a life that included happiness,” he said. “Perhaps the curse is not the birthmark at all, but the stubborn belief that I might deserve something better than what I was given.”
“Stop it.”
The word came out sharp.
Fiona stepped directly in front of him, forcing him to meet her gaze.
“Stop speaking of yourself as though you are something monstrous,” she said fiercely. “You are not cursed. You are not a danger to me. And I will not stand here and listen while you dismantle the very happiness we fought to build.”
He did not reply.
But the storm in his eyes had not yet passed.
“I don’t know how,” he said at last, and his voice broke on the words. “I don’t know how to fight. I have only ever known how to hide.”
“Then let me teach you.”
She stepped closer, pressing her forehead to his, feeling the uneven warmth of his breath against her lips.
“Let me be your courage, the way you have been my shelter. Let me carry you when you cannot walk. Let me love you, Christian—even when you cannot love yourself.”
For a moment, neither of them moved. The wind swept around them, carrying the sharp scent of salt from the sea below, and the clouds shifted enough for a thin wash of moonlight to spill across the cliff.
Christian closed his eyes.
“I can’t,” he whispered. “I’m sorry, Fiona. I can’t.”
Gently—almost tenderly—he lifted her hands from his face and stepped back, as though she were something fragile he feared he might break.
“Go back to Suffolk,” he said quietly. “Forget you ever came to Thornwick. Forget me.”
“Christian—”
He had already turned away, striding back toward the narrow path that led up from the cliffs, toward the distant lights of Thornwick and the life he had just decided to tear apart.
“Christian!” Fiona hurried after him, stumbling on the uneven ground as her ankle twisted against a stone. “Christian, please—don’t do this! Don’t walk away from us!”
He stopped at the edge of the path.
For a moment, she thought—hoped—he might turn back.
Instead, he stood with his back to her, shoulders bowed slightly against the wind.
