Chapter 188: Blue 2
ÉTIENNE
She crossed the garden before I had managed more than a few steps toward her.
The moment she reached me, both of her hands framed my face. She turned it gently toward the fading light, studying every inch of my skin with quiet concentration. Her fingertips skimmed my jaw, my temple, the place where ruined flesh had once refused to heal.
"It is completely gone," she whispered, disbelief softening every word. "That is impossible."
"The healer said..."
"I know." Her gaze never left my face. "I was there when he realized."
Silence settled between us.
Not awkward, not empty. It simply existed, stretching longer than the conversation required.
She was still touching me.
My heart answered before my mind could.
It had become impossible to dismiss these moments as accidents. Every glance lingered too long. Every brush of her hand stayed with me long after she stepped away. Somewhere along the way, wanting her had stopped being something I could excuse as vengeance wearing another face.
"Are you completely alright?" she asked quietly.
Her hands drifted lower, toward the place where the wound had nearly killed me.
I caught her wrists before she could pull open my shirt.
"I’m fine."
"Let me check."
"Margaux."
She looked up.
I held her wrists loosely, enough to stop her, not enough to imprison her. Even through the sleeves of her dress, I could feel the warmth of her skin, the quick pulse beneath my fingertips.
"I am fine," I said, unable to stop smiling. "Better than fine."
She searched my face as though trying to decide whether fever had finally stolen my senses.
"Do you want to say something?"
I looked toward the darkening sky before returning my attention to her.
"I don’t know where I went while I was unconscious." My voice came slower than I expected. "But wherever it was... I left something behind."
She waited.
"I’ve spent years convincing myself I knew exactly what kept me alive."
"The anger."
I nodded.
"At first it was grief. Then anger. Then hatred. Eventually it became purpose. Every morning I woke with someone to blame and something to destroy." A quiet laugh escaped me, bitter around the edges. "It was efficient."
Her expression didn’t change.
"I told myself I wanted you close because your family owed me." I swallowed. "Because watching you reminded me why I couldn’t stop. That these flowers were to remind me of how much I was to despise you."
The words hung between us.
"I repeated that lie so often it became easier than admitting the truth."
Her breathing slowed.
"What truth?"
I looked directly into her eyes.
"The truth is that somewhere along the way, I stopped looking for excuses to hate you."
The confession left my chest lighter than I deserved.
"I started looking for excuses to see you... to keep you close..."
Her lips parted.
"I could never forget your face. Your scent. I could even fucking recognize your footsteps before anyone spoke your name." I smiled faintly. "I memorized things no enemy should ever notice."
"Étienne..."
"I fought it because still wanting you felt like betraying everyone I lost."
My grip loosened, though I never truly let go of her hands.
"I convinced myself that if I called it obsession, revenge, curiosity, anything except what it was, I could survive it."
A breath escaped me.
"I couldn’t."
She stared at me as though the world had tilted beneath her feet.
"When I was lying there between life and death..." My voice grew quieter. "The anger wasn’t what reached for me."
I lifted one of her hands and pressed it carefully against my chest.
"You did."
Her palm rested over the steady beat of my heart.
"It wasn’t revenge calling me back."
I covered her hand with my own.
"It was the thought that I might never see you smile again... cry again... That I might never hear you argue with me, or tell me I was insufferable, or watch you fuss over injuries that had already healed."
A fragile laugh escaped her, immediately chased away by shining eyes.
"I have spent years believing hatred was the strongest thing I could feel."
I shook my head.
"I was wrong."
The words came without hesitation, without fear. There was nothing left to hide.
"I love you, Margotine."
The garden fell silent.
Even the breeze seemed to pause among the forget-me-nots, as though the young night itself were listening.
She stared at me, her eyes searching mine with an intensity that stole the breath from my lungs.
I smiled, small and almost disbelieving.
"I love you," I said again, because once was not enough. I had spent years constructing walls high enough to keep those words imprisoned. They deserved to exist in the open, spoken without shame, spoken until neither of us questioned them.
"I don’t want to carry hatred anymore," I continued quietly. "I don’t want rage to be the only thing that gives my life direction. I want something beyond revenge." My fingers tightened gently around hers. "I want mornings that don’t begin with old ghosts. I want a future that belongs to us instead of the past."
I drew a slow breath.
"And if you’ll have me... I want you in every part of it."
For a long moment, she said nothing.
Moonlight spilled across her face, soft enough to catch the silver in her eyes. Around us, the forget-me-nots swayed gently, their pale blossoms turning the garden into something almost unreal.
Then she closed the distance.
Her lips met mine with quiet certainty.
The kiss in the kitchen had been born from desperation, from relief, from emotions that had burst free before either of us could stop them.
This kiss was different.
It was chosen.
It carried no uncertainty, no hesitation, only the steady promise that neither of us intended to walk away.
I cupped her face, memorizing the softness of her skin beneath my palms as I kissed her back. Every restraint I had clung to for years unraveled with astonishing ease. The walls I had mistaken for strength dissolved beneath the warmth of her mouth and the quiet sound she made when I drew her closer.