---
And Lily, who had been brave in too many rooms and steady through too many impossible conversations, let herself be quiet inside his arms.
The feeling of her there altered something in him.
Not dramatically. But deeply.
He lowered his face into her hair for one brief breath and closed his eyes.
Mine, some dark and dangerous part of him thought.
His wife.
The words were far too satisfying.
Lily tilted her head slightly against his chest. "You are squeezing me like you are afraid I will disappear."
"I am checking whether it's real or not."
That earned a very soft laugh from her, the sound half muffled in him.
"And?"
"Still undecided."
She leaned back just enough to look up at him, and because they were already too close and because the room was too quiet and because he had spent all evening behaving correctly in front of other people, the sight of her face there beneath his was enough to strip the last of his patience with distance.
He touched her jaw with his thumb.
