“Really?”
“I don’t think he expected us to come so fast,” Connor says, emerging from another room. He pushes his hair out of his face. “And I don’t think he expected all of us. He probably thought it would just be you.”
As if we would ever split up. As if we aren’t a family, prepared to go down together.
But that’s the difference between Dmitri and us. He had nothing, no one. All he had was fear. Of course, he didn’t think my brothers would risk everything with me. Even as obvious as it was that they would, he didn’t think they’d take the chance.
I look around the room, searching, and find Rose.
She’s huddled around the corner, right near where she dove when Dmitri ran. I breathe out, and it feels like I’m letting a decade of tension leave my body. I catch her gaze and watch her eyes fill with tears, shining brightly as she looks up at me.
Reaching her in several long strides, I drop to my knees and pull her to me, wrapping my arms around her body.
I just want to feel her, her warmth and the certainty of her weight pressed against me. Rose exhales shakily against my shoulder. She shudders, her hands tight in my shirt as she holds me close.
“Aiden—”
“Shh,” I whisper, quieting her. I pull back only far enough to kiss her face—her eyes, her nose, her cheeks, her mouth.
I need to reassure myself as much as her. I need to know she’s in my arms, safe. Finally.
“I love you,” I say, fierce and low. “I fucking love you, more than I ever thought I could.”
“I love you too,” Rose says, gasping through her tears. She buries her face in my shoulder and then pulls back, looking me in the eyes.
Her hands move from my back, pressing against my cheeks. She holds me in place, her eyes locked on mine, drinking everything in.
“I love you,” she repeats, stronger. “I love you so much, Aiden.”
I brush her hair away from her face. She has blood on her cheek from Dmitri. I wipe it away, trying to erase the marks he’s made. I won’t let him hurt her, or anyone else.
I kiss her again, the press of my lips both tender and fierce.
Dmitri couldn’t take this away. He could never rip us apart, no matter how hard he tried. All his planning couldn’t break the bond between us. No matter what he did, we’re still here, still together.
He couldn’t kill our love. He couldn’t even scratch it.
“What happened to him?” Rose asks quietly.
I look over her shoulder, toward the doorway. I can see my brothers pause. They heard and they’re listening, suddenly tuned in, waiting to know what we have to do next.
I turn my gaze away and say, “He’s dead.”
Rose pulls back suddenly. Her eyes are wide as she looks at me, mingled relief and fear stark in her gaze.
“What?”
“You don’t have to worry about him anymore.”
That much is true.
The reality is that the Assembly will have every right to take action against me. Against my brothers. They made a ruling and we disregarded it. More than that, I killed the head of another family.
There will be consequences for that.
“It’s all right,” I say quietly. I pull Rose to me, cocooning her small body with mine. “I had to come. There was no fucking way I wouldn’t.”
Rose’s hands tighten in my shirt, and for a long moment, we’re both silent. Then she sniffs and leans back, turning to look toward a door that leads to a descending staircase.
