33. Anastasia
Anastasia
W hen I wake I’m cold.
Alone.
Panic surges me upright in the darkness as I clutch the duvet to my naked chest.
“Rhett?” I call out into the silence.
No lights are on and he doesn’t answer.
I flick the side lamp on and swing out of bed. When I don’t find him in the room or the bathroom my chest begins to tighten.
Did he leave me?
Oh god, does he regret what happened between us because of the day?
Guilt swims in my stomach as I get dressed. Maybe he doesn’t want to see me, but my eyes fill with the determination to find him. Whether to apologize or just console him or— Fuck , I don’t know what I’m doing, but I can’t stay here.
I track Rhett through the location app and he’s not far. It brings me to an expensive hotel, and I’m puzzled, my mind racing. At first I try searching down the streets beside it, but they turn up empty at this hour. So I head inside.
I’m greeted by staff who ask if I have a room or need one. I barely take in their words as the location app tells me Rhett should be right here.
“Did you see a man? He has light blond hair, very tall, blue eyes?”
The concierge remains confused. “Sorry, ma’am, I don’t think so. Is there anything I can do for you?”
“No,” I say, backing away.
Where is he?
My eyes scan through the bar that’s closing up, and then to the empty fancy restaurant. Then my gaze drifts up.
For a second my thought seems too desperate to be true, but now I can’t rule it out.
In the elevator I hit the rooftop floor.
My heart thumps hard, picking up speed with every number that ticks by, until I’m nauseous after the thirty fifth ding signals I’ve arrived on the roof.
Then my chest hollows at the brick keeping the escape door from shutting, because I know I’ve found him. And I become terrified to discover why he’s here.
I’m freezing before I even slip through the open gap. I walk around looking for him until I spy a silhouette.
He sits precariously on the ledge, and my breath catches with a skip of fright.
I approach carefully, too afraid to even blink, as that’s all it would take for him to disappear.
“Rhett,” I whisper, stopping a few paces away.
His shoulders straighten from their slump, but he doesn’t turn around. So I take another step. Then another.
“I proposed to her here. In the restaurant,” he says. I hear the cracks in his voice even though it’s barely a whisper against the wind, which is stronger up here. “I’ve come here every Christmas Eve night, and I tried not to this time. I didn’t want to leave you, but I had to.”
“It’s okay,” I say. Another slow, fearful step. “I understand.”
His head shakes. “For three years I’ve looked at this view and made peace with the fact it will eventually be my last.”
My eyes flood with heartbreak as I look out at the cityscape. I don’t touch him when I finally get close enough. Instead I flatten my palms against the icy stone and hoist myself up.
“Ana, it’s not safe.”
I don’t listen, partly because I catch a glimpse of the very long way down and I have to focus on swinging my legs around and taking breaths of courage. I’ve never been great with heights. My legs dangle over the ledge and my fingers bite into the stone.
“I’m safe with you,” I say, looking over the sleeping city as if I can place myself in his mind, try to understand a fraction of what he’s feeling.
Rhett erases the small space between us and my muscles loosen when his arm wraps around me. “I hoped you wouldn’t wake. I never would have left if I’d thought you’d come looking again.”
“I’ll always come.”
“Why?”
For the first time, I turn my head and I don’t expect the impact of meeting those blue eyes. It feels like it’s the first time, but also like I’ve held them for a lifetime. He’s so beautiful it pains me.
Erupts in me.
I’m overwhelmed all at once.
Because I love him.
I’m in love with Rhett Kaiser, and it’s the most vulnerable and peaceful realization that consumes me.
I take in every detail of his perfect face as if it belongs to me—every part of him.
Suddenly there’s no seeing a day beyond now without him in it, and there’s no day from the past as treasured as those since the moment he walked into my life.
“I don’t want to lose you,” I say quietly. That’s all I can admit right now.
It’s not fair to throw that kind of declaration at him when this time of year is so sensitive to the true love he lost. I fear his rejection more than anything. That he’ll distance himself from me and I won’t be able to bear it.
Rhett’s dark brows pull together as his hand slips over my face.
“I came here tonight because I had to know ...” he says, but he takes a pause and it’s like I can feel his agony.
I take his hand and circle his arm instead, leaning my head to his shoulder.
He continues. “I looked out at this view tonight only to know for certain I don’t want it to be my last anymore. I don’t want to come back here again.”
My lip wobbles and a tear escapes. I’m so relieved I can’t hold back my flood of emotion.
“Thank you,” I whisper. To him. To whoever or whatever is out there that gave me him.
“Look at me,” he says. I do, and his thumb brushes the wet trail of my tears.
Rhett’s eyes search every inch of my face, but he abandons his words to kiss me instead. Then it’s like we’re flying. With the wind tangling between us, around a view that I will make sure isn’t his last. Whatever it takes. I’m his.