Page 123 of Sands of Atonement

It was now he who shook his head, his jaw clenched.

“Why did you hate me?” I pressed.

He met my eyes. “I never hated you, Eshe. But I did feel weak around you, flustered—nervous. I didn’t know what to do with myself around you as much as Casimir did, so… I ignored you, tried not to resent you, knowing that one day I would have you to myself, whether or not you liked it. I had never thought you would pick him over me. It isn’t an excuse, but I forced myself not to care. I was a child then. I wasn’t a man yet.”

I forced myself to breathe in and out.

“And you are now?” I croaked.

“It doesn’t matter now,” he said in a clipped, distant tone.

My heart felt like it could break. Why did I feel as if there was no air outside? No light in the sun? Suddenly, there was no brightness in the place we were in.

I couldn’t look at him anymore. I looked at everything but him.

I wanted to clench the ache in my heart, but instead fisted my dress in front of me, trying to prevent the feeling of being suffocated and allowing it to swallow me whole.

I was surrounded by water.

I was trapped. Emotions poured into me.

“Eshe,” he said my name, but I could barely hear him.

I was having a hard time breathing.

He was in front of me, closer than before.

I heard him call my name again, but I couldn’t stop how confusing all this was. He had wanted me. He saved me, not Salazar. He—he did all of this. He sent me away. He wanted me. My heart felt as if it were in my throat. Or in my stomach. I couldn’t⁠—

His hand wrapped around my neck, and he pushed my jaw higher so that I was forced to look at him. My pulse was racing, and I couldn’t see him straight.

Why was I crying? Why did he make me feel these things for him?

I shook my head. “I don’t want him, Ezra.”

His hand tightened slightly.

“You’re mine, only mine.”

“But—”

His finger silenced my lips. His gaze had turned so serious, but also so distant.

He was trembling, too.

Why was he trembling?

His hand moved to the back of my neck and pulled me closer. He was between my legs in the waters. My body flushed against his hard chest. He brushed a thumb across my cheek, and time stilled again.

“You were always mine, Eshe. Always. Even when you chose him over me, you were mine.”

A strange sensation that felt a lot like relief washed over me, and I let out a breath.

“You know that, don’t you?”

I closed my eyes, a tear slipped down my cheek, and I nodded.

“Look at me,” he ordered.