Page 162 of Juliet & Her Romeos

I burst out purring, pushing my hand against his palm.

“I love you too.” I smile up at Ambrose.

He’s much taller than I am. It suits him.

Then he scowls like a winter god. “You’re cold. Where are your gloves? Give me your hands.”

Confused, I raise my hands, which are reddened by the freezing air.

Ambrose tears off his own gloves and tenderly fits them over my hands, tightening them as much as he can.

They’re so much bigger than they should be that it’s comical. But they smell of my Alpha and they’re cozy.

My purr deepens.

I glance at Ambrose in surprise, before wiggling my fingers in the soft material, which is already warming my tingling fingers.

“So, this is why Swan shoved me out here to enjoy the starlight.” I grab Ambrose’s hand in my gloved one. “You schemed together to surprise me with this.”

Ambrose quirks his brow. “Scheming is a talent of the Romeos. It’s New Year’s Eve, and I’ve dreamed for years of being able to spend it with you.”

“How many years?”

“What if I told you that I craved to make a bonding promise with you from the moment that I saw you?”

I glance up at the stars to avoid meeting Ambrose’s scorching gaze.

It’s too much because it’s both what I’ve fantasized to hear him say since I obsessively doodled his name across my exercisebooks and watched him every day in front of his locker, and because there’s no doubt that it’s true.

“Juliet,” Ambrose pushes a strand of hair behind my ear, “you’re the only woman who I’ve dated, kissed, or wanted to make mine. I never touched another because somehow, I felt like my heart had already made a promise to yours, even if we’d barely spoken. It was agony, knowing that we belonged to rival families.”

He drags me closer into his arms, then he turns me and together, we silently watch the stars in the vast sky.

Finally, I force myself to ask because I have to know, “Why did you suddenly leave, if you knew that we should be together? Couldn’t you have worked out a way to stay in America and for us to bond, when we were old enough?”

Ambrose’s shoulders become stiff. The shadows in the bond darken.

For a long moment, I don’t think that he’ll answer.

Then Ambrose says, still looking up at the stars, “It’s almost midnight. Just enjoy the evening. I have more surprises left—”

“I have to know,” I insist.

“I made a choice.” Ambrose pulls me tighter against his chest but he still doesn’t meet my eye. “I own that choice and I don’t regret it. But the consequences to me were that I immediately had to leave for England. I didn’t get to speak to anyone and I couldn’t contact them afterward.”

My throat is dry. “Why? Is it to do with your scar?”

Ambrose breaks away from me, prowling to the ice sculpture and examining it.

I can tell, however, how distracted he is.

“Oh, this scar?” He lifts his thumb to trace down from his eyebrow to his cheekbone, as if he’s forgotten that it’s there. I know that’s not true. “I was attacked by a wild wolf in Scotland, while protecting an Omega prince.”

My eyes widen. “Really?”

“Of course not. I’m teasing.”

“Jerk.”

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