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January 29 - January 30, 2025
“If I had to choose between that train and Milla, I’d trade that fucking locomotive in a heartbeat if it meant having her back.”
My family and the other descendants in this city didn’t cross the Narrow Sea all those years ago just to face the same danger. We wouldn’t be silenced, singled out, or sent away.
“If you would let them rot in that hellish place, then get the fuck out of here. I don’t have time to make a fancy speech to convince you why this is the right thing. If you’d like to be a part of something bigger than yourselves, if you’re tired of letting powerless men make you feel powerless, then I will gladly accept your help.”
“All change starts with one person pissed off enough to get their hands dirty.”
“Men like us, York, we go to the same hell. Double-cross me and I’ll be waiting for you across the veil.”
But everything made me think of him. The grey of the sky was the same storm in his eyes. The feel of the breeze slipping beneath my tunic only lacked the charge of his remnant. The scent of smoke from the watchman a familiar blend.
I’d kept every word Nico ever spoke to me and stored it in the deepest place of my memory, in that place where the heart kept the soul. Nico had seen my potential all along. Perhaps it was time I proved it to him—and to myself.
She killed a few guards. Had taken out part of the fucking island—the alleged impenetrable stone. The news swelled pride in my heart. “That’s my girl,” I murmured.
I would bring Milla home, or I wouldn’t come back at all. Either way, I wouldn’t spend another day without her. The thought alone was enough to lift something heavy off my shoulders, permit me to take a full breath again.
It was time to get my wife back.
I’d destroy Delilah and her staff, the guards, and purge the world of their cruel curiosity. Then perhaps finally some good would come of Chaos.
I glanced around the room, searching the masked faces for the one who commanded the wind and my heart.
“Nico,” I whispered. He smiled. Steel-grey eyes settled over me. “Hello, princess.”
I could have stared at her all night, amazed by her existence and her beauty and her power if not for the flash of warning from my remnant striking through my marrow.
“You all came for me? Why?” Because I love you. Because they know I do.
Her scent, the silky skin over her throat, those eyes that were my personal form of glint, rendering me powerless as they crossed me—this is what I’d burn the world to have and keep forever.
“There isn’t a hell in the void that could keep me from you, Milla. I’d suffer for a lifetime to have another moment on your lips.”
The heat between us became a tangible fire, burning away every painful moment without her, burnishing it with a new purpose. Making way for a future.
“Don’t tempt me to find some, Nicolai. I’m not in the right mind to be merciful.” “She’s stunning when she’s homicidal, isn’t she, cousins?”
He was danger and darkness and deliverance, and he was every desire of my soul embodied.
“You’re the most beautiful thing I’ve seen.”
I was angry for a very long time, Milla. Until I found a reason to be happy again. Once my purpose shifted from revenge to . . . someone else.”
No more forgotten names.” “No easy deaths,”
“If what happened at the prison wasn’t demonstration enough, allow me to be very clear on how I handle people threatening to take my wife from me,” I said.
“Your laugh is a song of victory, proving you faced their worst and not only survived, but came out with joy still in your heart. And that fucking smile, not to mention your eyes—the light still shining in your eyes—they are beacons to me, guiding me to my true home as they have since the first time I caught a glimpse of them.”
“This body might feel and look different, Milla, but every change reminds me of how much you fought their cruelty. This body got you through Hightower, and for that reason, I will worship every sign of its resilience.”
“You can be called anything you like, Camilla, but your title will never change what you truly are to me.” “And what is that?” I asked. Bringing both of my hands to his lips, he kissed the spot they overlapped. “Mine.”
“Welcome home, my love.”
“You can kiss her later, Nico! Open the door!” Esme shouted through the glass. Milla laughed against my lips, about to move away until I kissed her harder, using my free hand to pull the blinds shut and block out my nosy cousin.
Milla turned to me then, her hand extended to me. “Come with me?” I’d have taken it no matter where she led me. To the end of the fucking realm, if that’s where she was going, I’d follow.
“You’re just jealous you had to read about trains while I was learning how to fuck—” “Nico!”
“You are different. You are my wife, Milla. There is nothing that would keep me from you, nothing I wouldn’t sacrifice.”
I lifted slightly on my knees, enough to slip my hand beneath my leggings and between my legs and gathered the evidence of my arousal. When I displayed it to him, he drew them into his mouth and licked my taste from my fingers.
“Tell me what you want, husband.” “I want to be inside you.”
I had him exactly where I wanted him. A tangled mess of need and adoration. The strongest man I’d ever known, undone beneath me.
The thought of Camilla in a long dress in front of the family, Nonna’s ring on her finger as we spoke vows of forever, the formality of it all made my heart fill with air and soar in my chest.
It was late in the evening when I returned to Esme’s garage. My false hand laid propped on a soft cloth on one of her workbenches. She didn’t even look at me as I entered the shop. “It’s finished then?” “Yes,” she blurted. She stared at anything but my face.
“Perhaps that’s why Milla calls me Daddy every night.”
“Men. You have all the courage to bust into a high security prison and rescue your woman, but saints forbid you say a four-letter word.”
I don’t want to live another day without you, Milla. I buried you once. I wouldn’t survive doing it again.”
“You’re stronger than you think, Nicolai.” “But you are my greatest weakness.”
“I don’t need your help, Milla. You’ll stay fucking still until I’m done with you, alright?”
There he was—the Nicolai Attano I married in my family’s courtyard. Arrogant, demanding, in charge.
“Don’t you dare silence those pretty sounds for my sake, Milla. Let the city hear you if you want to be heard. Remind them all that I serve you. There’s no one else I’d get on my knees for, princess.”
“What the hells is that?” “My upgrade, as you called it.” Seven hells and shitting saints, he could vibrate them now?
“Perfect,” he said in my ear. “So fucking pretty, those sounds you make.”
“Yes, please.” He groaned in approval. “So polite. I’ll fuck those manners out of you.”
“Where’s Luther?” I asked her, noticing the cousin no longer hung on the back. “Luther?” Nico asked. “He jumped off about halfway here.” Bellamy cleared her throat. “He said something about needing the exercise.”
“It sounds like you’re planning to keep me forever, Attano.”
“I’ve got lots of plans for you. They all end in forever.”
