Cecilia, present day

---

“What are you doing here, Colin?” Cecilia asked.

He’d closed the door to the sauna and sat back down next to her, naked except for a small hand towel tossed haphazardly over his . . .

Penis, Cecilia Thiele, her mind shouted. It’s his penis and it’s giant and glorious and you want to lick it like a lollipop!

She tore her eyes up and focused on his face, but then got sidetracked by the little scar above his lip and then by his lips themselves. They were yummy and lush and just so flipping kissable. Seriously, the world wasn’t fair. What kind of universe gave a man a mouth like that?

And then he had to go and talk.

To be sweet and keep his words both simple and heart-wrenching.

“Because, sweetheart, I couldn’t stay away.”

“Dammit,” she muttered, glancing up at the ceiling, studying the single bulb hanging from the paneled wood. Condensation had gathered on the glass, and the drops sparkled as the light shone through.

The effect was beautiful, even though it was slightly blurry through the lens of her tears.

It was just that he sounded so genuine, and she wanted nothing more than to believe that he wanted her. But how could she?

But . . . maybe he did?

No. People didn’t change, not truly, not deep down, and he might want her now, but that would inevitably change and then he would push her away and she would end up broken all over again.

She couldn’t end up broken again.

“I can’t,” she said. “I can’t do this, Colin. I can’t hurt this much and have all this regret and pain and angst. My life is supposed to finally be about me. I need to find out who I am without my job and the remains of our relationship hanging over me. Without my parents’ disappointment weighing me down. I need to—”

“I understand.” He took her hand in his. “I get not knowing who you are and your world imploding. I understand that you were hurt and I’m sorry that—”

Sweat trickled down between her breasts when she shot to her feet. “No, you don’t understand because you weren’t the one left shattered. You weren’t the one who was devastated when all you’d hoped for a future was fucking gone.”

He stood and cracked the door, reaching for a robe and handing it to her then repeating the process for himself.

When they were both covered, he touched her cheek. “You weren’t the only one devastated, CeCe. My father was dead, the business was one wrong decision away from collapse, and you were gone.” His voice tightened. “You can’t say I was unaffected because I was. My life was fucking broken too.”

Her breath caught as the truth of his words hit home. “I-I’m sorry.”

Silence stretched between them as they stared at each other. Colin’s blue eyes were filled with emotion and longing, and she felt an answering yearning rise within her.

She wanted those easy times. The hikes on the cliffs, the rides on his horse, the kissing and . . . more.

If only they could go back.

If only they could forget the past.

But life wasn’t that easy. Or at least hers wasn’t. She couldn’t just put the pain aside and pretend it hadn’t happened. She ached and burned and hurt. But maybe . . .

Maybe they could move forward.

“Col?” she asked, when all he did was continue to stare at her. “What are you doing?”

“I’m memorizing every detail of your face so that when you kick me out into the bloody cold Finnish weather, I’ll remember that you have a freckle just beneath your eye and another on the top corner of your lip. I’ll remember exactly the way your eyes curve near their corners and how your top lashes are thicker than the bottoms. I’ll remember the hint of pink”—he swiped a finger over both of her cheekbones—“just here and here. I’ll remember every part of you for the rest of my life. I let the details get blurred in the past, and while I couldn’t ever hope to forget you, at least now I’ll be able to remember you as perfect as you are in this moment.”

Her pulse had picked up its pace during his speech, and her skin had gone taut, heating with desire, with embarrassment, with awe. “I think that’s the most words I’ve ever heard you say at one time.”

One half of his mouth curved. “Probably.”

Silence fell between them again. “Do you really notice all of that?”

A nod. “Aye.”

She groaned. “No fair busting out the full Scottish accent.”

“Nothing is fair in love and war, lass.”

CeCe groaned again, but it was to hide the way her heart had skipped a beat at the word love. Though truth be told, it skipped another when Colin called her lass.

Ugh.

But also, aw.

And also, shit, shit, she was really going to do this. “Col—” she began.

“Aye?”

Or something like it.

“You’re laying it on real thick. But”—she reached up and placed a finger across his lips when he opened his mouth, presumably to protest—“that wasn’t what I was going to say.” He nipped at her finger, and she jumped back. “Hey! Behave.” And yet, Cecilia was grinning and felt light for the first time in years. “I was going to say that maybe we could bring the food over to the bed beneath the glass roof, lie down and—Colin! Stop grinning. I was going to say lie down and watch for the aurora borealis.”

“Well, that’s disappointing.” But he grinned and pushed her in the direction of the bed. “Get comfortable, and I’ll grab the food.”

She curled up and watched the sky get fully dark, popping grapes and cheese and crackers into her mouth almost as fast as Colin handed them over. They talked, not about the past, but about the places she wanted to visit next.

Paris because the Eiffel Tower and the Louvre were a must.

Copenhagen because her grandfather had lived there and she wanted to visit the palaces and see the colorful buildings next to the harbor.

The Alps. Barcelona. The Colosseum. And back to London.

Because Hyde Park and old English manners and changeable weather and small twisting streets surrounded by tall buildings.

And also, she thought, her heart catching when the sky lit up with a magical green hue, back to London because it was closer to a confusing, sweet Scottish man who’d stolen a piece of her heart and had never given it back.