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I lean my head back against his shoulder, still trying to catch my breath. “More than alright,” I murmur. “I think you broke my spine in at least three good ways.”

A low chuckle rumbles through his chest, vibrates where our bodies meet, makes my toes curl all over again.

He presses his lips to the top of my head. “Good.”

We sit there like that for a while, curled together in a messy tangle of limbs and satisfaction, the warm hush of the office wrapping around us like a shield. I bury my face against his neck, breathing in his scent—smoke and citrus and something uniquely Malachi. It smells like home.

Anxiety strikes without warning. When did I start thinking Malachi felt like home? My heart picks up speed again as I realize I’m not falling for Malachi. I’ve already fallen and deeper than I’ve been willing to admit to myself.

“What’s wrong?”

I should have guessed Malachi would notice the beginnings of a freak-out. It only makes it worse. Do I tell him? We haven’t talked about what we really are yet. But we basically live together and he’s told me that I’m his. Taking a deep breath, I pull on the same courage I needed when I was standing in my living room holding a six-month-old baby for the first time.

I’m still enough of a coward that I can’t look at him as I whisper, “I think I’m in love with you.”

Is it possible to throw up and suffocate at the same time? Because that’s absolutely what I’m feeling like.

“I want to mark you,” he says, so softly I almost miss it from the wheezing in my ears. Then my brain actually processes his words.

I pull back just enough to look up at him.

“What?”

He doesn’t repeat himself right away; instead, his fingers trace slow, tender lines down the front of my throat to my chest, he taps two fingers above my heart. “Right here. I want to mark you as mine. For real.”

Something sharp and hot twists low in my stomach. “You mean... like, officially? As your mate?”

His eyes burn into mine and I’ve never hated those colored contacts more. He nods once, slowly, as if facing a wild animal who might startle and run at any moment.

“I’ve fought against the idea my whole life,” Malachi says, voice raw now, stripped of its usual charismatic edge. “Told myself I wasn’t meant for it. That vampires like me—violent men with blood on our hands—we don’t get mates. We’re not supposed to need anyone.”

He strokes my cheek with the back of his hand, and the trembling there… it isn’t just his.

“But then you walked into my life with your lilac hair and lion’s heart, and some stupid part of me—the old part, the quiet part I’ve buried under centuries of war—started to hope. And now I can’t remember the last time I breathed without thinking of you.”

My heart stumbles. I press my palm against his chest, grounding myself in the steady beat beneath. “You know I come as a package deal, right? It’s not just me. It’s Charlie, too.”

His arms tighten around me, no hesitation. “I wouldn’t have it any other way. She’s a brilliant, brave kid. I’d be proud to be part of her life—and yours. I’d do anything for both of you.”

The emotion hits me like a crashing wave. It’s not just the culmination of everything we’ve survived, It’s the feeling that for the first time, someone truly sees all of me and has decided to stay. My fear. My strength. My daughter. My past. And somehow, he still chooses me.

I nod, throat too tight to speak, overwhelmed by the enormity of it.

Malachi kisses me again—slower this time. Perfect. A promise sealed in silence.

Then there’s a knock at the door.

We both freeze.

Before either of us can answer, Ashe strides in with a grim expression on his face.

The moment shatters. I know, just know, that whatever he says next is going to be horrible.

“We have a problem,” he says.

ChapterTwenty-Nine

MALACHI