Page 97 of Heavy Crown

My answer has to be swift and certain, and reminding myself how definite I need to be leads to a hesitation. “Yes.”

“Tell me your plan.” She coats the island with more flour. “What are your steps to a successful extraction from your family?”

“I sign the paperwork tomorrow, and we leave the country.”

“Where would we go?” She bangs a plastic bowl onto the counter.

“Anywhere we want.”

“You realize that’s not a plan, correct?” She raises her eyebrows.

“I don’t care where we go.” Frustration leaks into my voice. Given how emotional she looks, she’s being very cold and calculating about this conversation.

“What would life be like in this mythical place on Tuesday?” She cracks an egg into the bowl. “What do you plan to do? Your whole life has been about serving Bellerive. Public service. Where would you work?”

I rub my face and wish I’d had time today to come up with any sort of plan. “I don’t know,” I admit. I’ve never worked for anyone other than my father. There’s never been an opportunity to choose my fate. “But none of that matters right now.”

“It matters to me.” She dumps flour into the bowl.

Fed up, I circle the island and take her hand in mine. “Do you want to be with me? If there’s a way we can be together forever, do you want it?” What angle do I need to work to get her to go along with me? While I didn’t expect this conversation to be easy, I didn’t expect so much obvious resistance.

She won’t meet my gaze, and when I tip her chin with my finger, tears tip over her eyelashes and onto her cheeks. My heart cracks at the sight.

“No,” she whispers. “I don’t want any of that.”

An ache blooms across my chest and ribs, the same one I experienced the night I saved her from going over the cliff. Unlike before, it’s not her that’s in mortal danger, it’s us. “I don’t believe you.”

“I don’t believe you either, so I guess that puts us in a difficult spot.” She juts out her chin, but tears trickle down her face.

I feather a kiss along her cheek, and her fingers curl into my shirt. She’s lying to me, and there’s going to be flour on my shirt as proof. I frame her face and brush her tears away with my thumbs. “I love you, Aurora Wilson, and I think you love me too.”

More tears pool in her eyes, and her chin trembles. “Even if it’s true, it’s not enough.” She takes a deep, shuddering breath and draws away from me. “Don’t quit because of me. I don’t want you to quit because of me. You think it’s enough right now, but it’s not.”

“Rory,” I murmur, and I try to draw her back to me.

She shakes her head and steps away to the corner of the island. “Even you don’t really want this, Alex.”

“I wouldn’t be here saying these things if I didn’t want this outcome,” I say in a burst of annoyance. “I don’t do things I don’t mean. No one can make me do something I don’t want to do.”

She purses her lips and nods her head. Her gaze is on the ceiling, and whatever is going through her head I won’t like.

“What we’ve built in this cottage isn’t real.” Her voice is thick.

“Don’t say that.” My chest tightens. How has this conversation gone so off track?

“We’ve created this bubble in here.” She throws out her arm. “But this isn’t real. We are not real. Whatever you think you feel for me today—it’s not real.”

Where is this coming from? How can she say that?

“Not real?” I stride toward her and grab her hand. “You want to know what’s real?” I place her hand over my heart. “Whenever I worry about you, or I think I might lose you, there’s this ache in my chest. Our connection is so powerful that the night we met, I thought I cracked a rib. There’s a tether between us, invisible but undeniable. The thought of not being with you, of anything happening to you, is physically painful.” I search her tear-stained face. “There is nothing in the world more real or permanent than my love for you.”

More tears spill onto her cheeks, and I tug her against my chest. She sinks into my arms, and she breathes me in. A sob escapes her, and she buries her face deeper into my shirt.

I rub her back in soothing motions and scramble for whatever else I need to say to put her fears at ease. This has to work between us. The alternative, any life without her, is a slow march to death. I cannot lose her.

She grips my shirt and tugs on it. A moan of frustration rises, and she releases me with a gentle push. “I know about Simone.” Her voice shakes.

The blood in my veins runs cold. “What?”