“I wasn’t alone.”
“Sure, you had your doctors—”
“I’m not talking about my doctors.” Henry smiles warmly, and it transforms his disfigured face into a thing of beauty. “There was one person I knew I could call. One true friend I was certain I could trust, above all others, to keep my secret. To keep me safe while I was regaining my strength, these past few weeks.”
“Who?” Chloe asks impatiently.
But I think I already know. A feeling is stirring inside me — the hairs on the back of my neck rising to attention, the iron in my blood magnetizing with a heady dose of awareness.
Could it be…?
Henry turns around to face the back of the church. He cranes his neck, gazing upward to the balcony where an impressive organ looms, its many pipes pointing at the domed mural.
I shield my eyes, straining to see what he’s looking at… and gasp as the silhouette of a man comes into view by the railing. Bracketed by light, the incredible cathedral ceiling a backdrop of pastel clouds, he looks like a fallen angel banished from the heavens.
Even from this distance, I can make out the familiar slope of his shoulders. The proud carriage of his profile. The undeniable strength in his arms as he braces his hands against the balustrade and stares down at us on the altar below.
I can’t see his face, but I somehow know — he’s looking right at me.
He was here the whole time.
Carter.
Motherfucking.
Thorne.
I’m running, then — a blur of white, bounding down three steps at once, nearly falling on my face as I leave the pulpit behind.
I don’t care.
I don’t even pause.
My dress snags on a sharp pew corner as I race down the aisle. I hear a rip and keep running.
Fuck the dress.
Fuck the world.
Nothing matters except getting to him.
I don’t know where the stairs to the balcony are, but I figure they cannot be far. As it turns out, it doesn’t matter. By the time I hit the middle of the aisle, he’s there, at the far end.
He’s been running too — he’s out of breath, his lungs pumping like a pair of bellows. When he steps into the aisle, we both go still. Frozen in our tracks, a dozen feet apart.
He looks devastatingly handsome in a navy blue suit, his dark hair combed back from his face in a way that highlights all his best features. Tears fill my eyes as I drink in the sight of him standing there, staring back at me in my ridiculous wedding dress.
I open my mouth to say something — anything. But there’s nothing to say.
There’s everything to say.
“I’m not the queen anymore,” I whisper finally. Haltingly. Hoping like hell it’s enough for him. “I’m just… I’m just…”
“Mine,” he growls, closing the gap between us in two bounds. “You are mine.”
His hard mouth hits mine, his strong arms go around me, and there, hauled up against his chest, sinking into the kiss of a man I love more than my life… more than my country… more than my past… more than my future… For the first time in months…
I am me.