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Caspian chuckled. “Oh, it’s real.” He started toward him, then stopped. “Actually, hold that thought.”

Caspian turned toward me.

The transformation in his face was immediate. The coldness disappeared, along with the anger and every trace of the ruthless man who had been staring down Chalis seconds earlier.

His eyes softened, then he smiled.

That smile.

The one I had spent six years wondering whether I would ever see again.

“I need to kiss my queen.”

I couldn’t move.

Caspian started toward me, and every step made my heart pound harder.

I wanted to run to him, throw myself into his arms, touch him, scream at him, kiss him, and cry all at once. Instead, I stood there with tears pouring down my face, watching the man I loved walk toward me like he had never been gone.

He stopped directly in front of me. “What’s up, beautiful?”

A sob escaped me. “Caspian?”

He smiled. “Yeah, baby.”

I lifted one trembling hand toward his face, almost afraid that the second I touched him, he would disappear. My fingertips brushed his cheek, and the breath caught in my throat. He was warm, solid… real. Not some shadow, not a dream, and not the memory of a man I had spent six years trying to hold on to.

A gasp caught in my throat. “Oh, my God. It’s really you.”

Caspian covered my hand with his, and for several seconds I could only focus on the warmth of his palm against mine.

“Yeah, baby. It’s me.”

I touched his chest, then his shoulders and arms before returning to his face because I couldn’t seem to stop myself. I needed proof everywhere my hands could find it.

“But how? How are you here?” I started crying harder. “I don’t understand. I thought…” My hands pressed against his chest again. “You said you’re dead.”

He brushed a tear from my cheek. “I am, baby.”

“But you’re here, and I can touch you.”

Somewhere beside me, Willow whispered, “What the actual fuck? Caspian?!”

He finally turned toward her, and a grin spread across his face. “What’s up, sister-in-law?”

Willow’s mouth fell open. Then, instead of answering him, she slowly lowered her attention to the cup in her hand like the liquor had personally betrayed her. She lifted it closer to her face, squinted down into the punch, and gave it a cautious little swirl.

I frowned. “What are you doing?”

“Investigating.”

“You made the punch.”

“I know that, which is why I’m concerned.” She sniffed it suspiciously, then took the tiniest sip like she was testing for poison. “I need to know if I accidentally put some psychedelic shit in here. Because either Caspian Black is really standing in front of me after being dead for six years, or I mixed this mothafucka way stronger than I thought.”

Caspian laughed.

Willow immediately pointed the cup at him. “Don’t laugh! I’m trying to rule out reasonable explanations before I accept that my dead brother-in-law just walked down the stairs looking better than half the living men at this party.”