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‘Naam, mine,’ Élisa said with some pride. ‘It’s where we have a weekly open market for the chasm tribes. We trade what we find in our travels off the planet for fresh food and essentials.’

We?

Riv’s heart pounded.

It was the first time she’d let on about the presence of someone else.

‘It’s also a treasure hunter’s delight,’ she went on, oblivious to his distress. ‘We stock clothing, art, and jewelry from all over Pegasi that the locals vie for. I’ve come to enjoy going off the beaten track to small markets to connect with local artisans and shipping their goods to Devansi.’

‘Fascinating,’ Riv rasped, his mind still trying to wrap itself around the concept of ‘we’ as they tracked past the building and started to climb.

Towards a structure set into the small mountain, with an undeniable 360° panorama across the rock-strewn and scrub ranges.

The home rose out of the hillside like a pebbled dinosaur, its curving stony rock spine roof hovering in the landscape.

Riv raised a brow. ‘Radical and yet imaginative.’

As they approached, he stared at its stone vertebrae that rose as columns and then fanned out to create a roof.

Something or someone moved dead ahead, and Riv stiffened, coming to a stop.

A figure emerged from the shadows and depths of the building.

That’s when Élisa surged.

With a cry, she flew past Riv, her feet churning at the sand and rocks on the steep path.

Riv paused, his eyes narrowing on her flight. He lifted a brow as she sailed onto the flat rock encircling the house before she launched herself at the distant figure.

His heart sank, thundering in trepidation.

The silhouette was male, tall, solid, and even this far, he glimpsed their long silver hair.

He stood rooted to the spot as they embraced in an extended hug.

Riv swallowed, his soul suffused with extreme sadness and loss as Élisa pulled back, and her laugh carried in the wind.

The strange man still had his arms around her. At the sight, Riv was beset with a sudden rush of jealousy so wild it tore through his body like a saw-toothed blade.

Unable to watch any more, he bent over and grabbed his knees, nausea washing over him in waves.

His worst fear had come true. His woman had left him for another.

Her heart had never been his to start with.

He gripped his legs, his heart, mind, and soul roiling with searing anger at the thought of some otherkinaistroking her. Making sweet love to her, living a whole life by her side.

The rage was followed by sorrow so cutting and tormenting that he almost fell to one knee.

Blinking back tears, he stared down at the ground, seeing nothing of the formations of the tiny granules under his feet.

The heat beat on his back, and for a moment, he wished it’d burn him and his pain up.

He’d never recover from this, as the cracks in his heart widened, wrenched open by disappointment and the wretchedness of failure.

So lost was he to his dejection that he almost missed the scrabble of rock and feet marching towards him.

‘You’ve nothing to fear.’