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And as we stood there, wrapped in each other’s arms, I felt the bond between us humming with strength, steady and unbreakable.

I had chosen him.

And somehow, impossibly, my mother had chosen us too.

Chapter Fifteen

I didn’t believe it until I felt it.

Carolina had burst through my door with her eyes wide and her cheeks flushed, telling me that her mother had relented. The curse would be dissolved at dawn. Freedom was finally close enough to terrify me.

I pulled her into my arms, kissed her until we were both dizzy, and laughed with a joy I had almost forgotten.

Still, the wounded part of me refused to believe it.

Jacqueline Fortman did not forgive. She did not relent. She certainly did not change her mind.

When the promised summons arrived just before dawn, I read it six times.

The invitation was written in Jacqueline’s elegant hand and requested my presence at the coven house for the formal dissolution of the Graceless Hex.

I went with my stomach tied in knots.

Carolina held my hand during the entire walk. She didn’t say much. She squeezed my fingers when they trembled, smiled whenever I looked at her, and reminded me to breathe.

“She’s really doing this,” I said for what had to be the tenth time.

“She’s really doing this,” Carolina confirmed.

“And it isn’t a trap?”

Her laugh rang through the morning air. “I honestly don’t know. But if it is, we’ll face it together.”

“That is both romantic and deeply concerning.”

“I contain multitudes.”

The ritual chamber looked different from Carolina’s description.

She’d told me how it had been packed with witches and buzzing with speculation during the emergency assembly. Now it held only the three of us.

Jacqueline stood at the center of the obsidian and moonstone mosaic. She had traded her crimson robes for white silk, the traditional color of purification and new beginnings.

“Mr. Richards,” she said. Her voice still carried its usual authority, but the edge had softened. “Thank you for coming.”

“High Priestess.” I bowed slightly. Not from fear, but from respect. “Thank you for doing this.”

She studied me for a long moment. Her eyes were the same shade of blue as Carolina’s, but they possessed none of her warmth.

“My daughter tells me you love her.”

“I do.”

“She tells me you would endure any curse, humiliation, or pain rather than see her harmed.”

“I would.”

“You knelt in my parlor and begged. Not for yourself. For her.”