Page 173 of Modern Romance September 2025 5-8
He swallowed the urge to lift her, to tell her off again for taking stairs too steep and uneven, to find him. She wouldn’t listen.
She’d delight in telling him that despite his vows, despite his decision not to care for her too deeply, to care about anything or anyone, he did. He cared.
And she was right. He did not want her to be. But he…cared.Deeply.
He’d shared himself with her, not only physically, but in ways he’d never shared himself before. He hadn’t used pretty pictures he created to express himself. With her, he’d used words, given her ugly images that haunted him, voiced his thoughts, and confessed his crimes. He’d revealed to her the man he was beneath his name.
Yet still she held his hand.
And despite himself, he enjoyed, craved even, her ability to prove him wrong.
She’d shown him that he could change.
They stepped out of the forest, and the trees shook with the wind, pushing them forward. He stopped, bringing them to a halt on the edge of the tree line. He watched the air lift the black silk kissing her shoulders.
‘You are stunning, Aurora,’ he growled, his voice raw.
‘Thank you’ she responded. ‘I feel beautiful.’ The edges of her painted plum lips curved upwards, and he couldn’t help it. So did his. He smiled. Until the muscles he hadn’t used in such a long time ached.
‘Very,verybeautiful,’ he agreed.
The wind swept through the trees again.Harder.Red, brown and orange leaves left their branches. They scattered and fell around them like confetti.
And he knew it. In this moment, he wasn’t the only one to embrace change. Shehadchanged. No longer was she the broken creature screaming into the trees. She was vibrant. Confident. And it was so easy to feed from her youth, from her unbreakable confidence that her way was the right way.
Clarity cleared the last remaining doubts from his mind. The fog lifted, and so did something inside him.
She was right,hadbeen right, before she’d known his name, his face…
She had known him the moment their eyes had met.
She’d known their worlds colliding was the beginning.
The beginning of something special.
Shewashis awakening.
This goddess in red silk, sparkling with stardust, was his reckoning.
His redemption.
She cocked her head to the side. ‘Ready?’
He nodded.
He was.
Because of her.
His Aurora…
They both stepped forward, toward the castle, and he realised neither led the other. They walked together. Side by side. Hand in hand, out of the shadows, and into the full beam of a too bright sun.
He was not alone.
And it did not feel like weakness to have her beside him.
It was power.
