"The camper." She set the sweater down and turned to face him fully. "I'm thinking I'll leave it parked for a while. You know. Since I'll be staying at the condo."
Something flickered across his face. Hope, quickly suppressed. "The heater's still broken. It makes sense to?—"
"Tarmek." She stepped closer. "I'm not staying because of the heater."
"No?"
"No." She took his hands—massive compared to hers, rough with calluses, warm despite the cold. "I'm staying because I want to. Because you're there. Because—" Her voice caught. "Because I'm choosing you."
The words hung in the air between them.
His grip tightened on her fingers. "You're sure?"
"I'm terrified," she admitted. "I don't know how to do this. I've never stayed anywhere long enough to figure it out. But I want to try. With you. If... if you still want?—"
He kissed her tenderly enough to make her eyes sting.
"I want," he murmured against her lips. "More than anything."
"Okay." She let out a shaky breath. "Okay. So I guess we should take my stuff to the condo."
He looked around at all the things she hadn’t packed—the fairy lights and the pillows and the postcards—and frowned.
"What about the rest of it? We can hire movers."
"They don’t exactly go with your decor.”
“If you want them, then I want them too,” he said, trying not to wince as he glanced over at a pink sequined pillow.
“Liar,” she said affectionately. “But it's really not necessary.They belong here."
"If you change your mind, let me know and I’ll help you move them." He released one of her hands to cup her face. "That's the deal. You don't have to do things alone anymore. I'm here. I'm not going anywhere."
I'm not going anywhere.
She had heard those words before. From foster families who gave up after a few months. From friends who drifted away. From her own mother, probably, before she'd left Edie at a hospital at XXX three days old.
But standing in her cramped camper with snow falling outside and an orc who looked at her like she'd created the stars—for the first time in her life, she believed it.
Moving in took less than an hour.
Her possessions barely filled one corner of his living room. Two suitcases and half a dozen tote bags and art supplies and the miscellaneous collection of items she'd gathered over years of transient living. They looked small and almost pathetic against the backdrop of his organized, adult furniture.
"I'll buy a bookshelf," he said. "For your sketchbooks."
"You don't have to?—"
"And we should clear out the second bedroom. Make it a studio space."
She blinked at him. "A studio?"
"For your art." He was already moving towards the hallway, cataloging space in that methodical way of his. "The light's good in there. We can add adjustable lamps for night work. I saw some at that home goods store, the one with the ugly garden gnomes?—"
"Tarmek."
"—and if we move the guest bed to storage, there's enough room for an easel, maybe two if we orient them?—"
"Tarmek."
