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‘Yes Hello, Rafe I am Sam’

His brows rose at her flat voice

‘Yes, well I was just dozing when I heard my brother’s bark I can’t res of war’

Sa Her ust

‘Not a fan of the bard, are you? Never ry?’

‘Forced him to marry me’

‘No one forces Edge Well, I did once Dragged his carcase to Cu Don’t look like that’

‘Like what?’

‘Like your heart’s breaking’

She touched her forehead, her cheek Her eyes were dry as dust How could they show this crashing storm inside her?

‘Coirl’

Edge stood by the bed Sam lay with her back to him, curled into a ball around a pillow Inky was also curled into a ball, back to back with Sa at him as if she knew he’d been a fool

Worse—cruel, childish, jealous Sam had been honest with hi it so hard to live with her terms

The familiar burst of pain struck in his chest Every few hours it happened, like water slowly filling a vessel and then spilling over on to fla It was absurd and he hated it He was beco he despised—resentful, maudlindesperate

He wanted to take her to the house they’d found and start over—wipe everything away and tell her the truth

That he needed her

And worse—he needed her to love him

A thousand questions snapped at hiether in her bed and even then they burrowed under his skin, wondering if when she closed her eyes that man was there, a memory, a wish, a needinvisible but between them