Her fingers curled into my shirt, and she whispered, “I thought you were dead.”
I pressed a kiss to her forehead.
“I’m very much alive, and I’m done letting anything keep us apart.”
She exhaled shakily.
“Are you sure?”she asked.
I looked her dead in the eye.
“I’ve never been more certain of anything in my life.”
Her lips parted, and for the first time since I stepped into the convent, something opened in her expression—hope.
Hope for me.Hope for us.For a world that didn’t know what was coming.
I took her hand.
“Pack your things, Neve.We’re leaving.”
And when she nodded, when her small fingers tightened around mine like they were made for this, something inside me settled.Not softly or gently.
But with the quiet, devastating certainty of a man who had finally found the thing he’d burn kingdoms to protect.
Neve.
My girl.
My ruin.
My reason.
55
Neve
Atlas hadn’t let go of my hand as we walked down the quiet hallway.His grip was warm, steady, unyielding… the grip of the man who’d come to reclaim me.
My pulse jumped.My breath hitched.I felt like a skittish creature caught between terror and salvation, trembling between wanting to run and wanting to stay exactly where I was—held.
At the courtyard, Sister Ana waited beneath the archway, her posture serene, her expression soft with the kind of knowing that made my throat tighten.Her gaze flicked from Atlas to me, and her lips curved in a small, gentle smile.
“You found each other.As it was always meant to be.”
Heat crawled up my neck.Atlas didn’t look away from me when he answered.
“I’m taking her home.”
Home.
I had thought I’d carved a place for myself here, buried my grief and built a life out of silence and prayer.I had thought he was dead.I had thought the world had given me an answer.But now he stood beside me—alive, fierce, unmovable—and everything I’d tried to bury rose from the grave.
Sister Ana stepped closer and cupped my cheek with her cool hand.
“You are always welcome here,” she told me.“But you were never meant to stay hidden within these walls forever, Neve.”
My voice came out small.“I’m scared.”