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I grin as I press a kiss to her temple, content to just hold her for a bit as the sun continues to sink. “I do this a lot,” I tell her.

“What?” I feel her eyes on the side of my face. “Sit out here?”

“Mhm.” I nod idly. “The change starts when the sun passes the horizon, so oftentimes, I come here early to sit and wait. Just to be sure.”

She’s quiet for a moment, her voice soft when she finally asks, “Is it scary?”

“It used to be,” I tell her honestly. “The first time I changed…I was thirteen.” I give her a wry smile. “That’ll be the barn incident Blair and Rory told you about.” I sober, looking back at the water. “My mum had run off to Glasgow to be with her sister when my da disappeared, and I stayed behind to live with my granny. We knew that I would eventually succumb to the curse, and because of that, it seemed too risky to stray too far from the loch. I left after that, though. Moved up to Inverness. Tried my hand at a normal life for a while.” I breathe in deep before letting it out. “I’d tried to connect with my da, but even then he’d forgotten what it was like to be human. He didn’t recognize me.”

“I’m so sorry.”

I shake my head. “It is what it is.”

“Did it work?”

I turn my head, arching a brow at her. “Hm?”

“Living a normal life.”

“Oh. For a bit, yeah,” I say. “My da left me a trust, and since he was presumed dead, it came to me when I turned twenty-one. I didn’tneedto work, technically, but I got a job working for a construction company there. I liked working with my hands, see.”

“What about your mom? Did you…” She clears her throat. “Do you two still talk?”

“Sometimes. Like I told Rhona…I think it’s hard for her. She and my da…they were the real thing, aye? Loved each othersomething fierce. Even after he told her the truth of his curse not long after admitting he loved her…she never wavered in her feelings. It broke her when he never came home. That he was so close and yet might as well have been dead. Plus, I think seeing so much of him in me hurts her. Not to mention knowing that what could happen to him might happen to me.”

“But you’re still her kid,” Key says indignantly. “She practically abandoned you.”

I smile despite everything, hearing that same ferocity in her tone on my behalf. “Aye, you’re right. I don’t blame her, though. Maybe I did once…but not anymore.”

“So why did you come back?”

My brow knits, pulling her closer as fear grips me. I’ve been able to keep it at bay for some time now—but with Keyanna pressed so closely against me, with something to lose literally right here in my arms…I feel it even stronger now.

“I didn’t turn back one night,” I tell her quietly. “I thought the curse had taken me, like it did my da.”

I hear her soft gasp, feel her hand clenching my thigh. “What? For how long? Has it happened again?”

“It hasn’t,” I assure her. “It took two more sunrises for me to come back, and the only reason I didn’t lose it completely is because I still kept my mind. I knew from the times I’d tried to connect with my da that if it was truly the end, I’d be nothing more than a monster. That gave me hope.”

“Why do you think it happened?”

I shrug. “I can’t be sure. It was a stressful time. Work had been grueling, and my mother had an episode…She was in a facility for a while. Lost her head for a bit. I think…I think maybe the stress of it all made it harder to come back to myself.”

She goes deathly quiet, still for so long that I have to shift so I can turn to look at her.

“What is it?”

She doesn’t look at me, staring down at her lap instead. “What if I’m just making it harder for you to keep control? What if I’m somehow accelerating the process?”

“Don’t be daft, love,” I soothe. “You bring me a peace I’ve not had in a long while.”

She tilts up her face then, biting her lower lip. “That’s not going to happen to you,” she tells me, her eyes blazing. “What happened to your dad. I’m going to make sure of it.”

I study her face, reaching to brush my fingers over her cheek. Her lashes flutter with my touch, her lips parting as if in invitation. “Aye,” I murmur. “If anyone can…it’s you.”

Her mouth is soft and open when I lean to cover it with mine, a quiet sound escaping from deep inside her throat as my tongue slips past her lips to tease hers. My palm wraps around her jaw to hold her close, reveling in the softness of her, the warmth of her tongue as it tangles with mine.

I’ve touched her countless times since we first fell into bed together—and with each time I think that maybe this will be the time where the overwhelming feelings she instills in me will settle, where they won’t threaten to overtake me completely, but each time I’m proven wrong. Every time I touch Keyanna, it feelsright—like she’s made for me. Like she’smine.