Rachel thought her heart would stop at the sight of him. Her pulse tapped in her temples, her stomach flipping, her mouth dry.

Kolbjorn looked even more gorgeous than she remembered. The muscles of his chest and shoulders rolled like waves, and his skin glistened with sweat as he threw the sacks into the ship, his ripped stomach tensing and relaxing. Rachel could almost smell his masculine scent, almost taste the salt of his skin, and her knees grew weak.

But then he saw her, their eyes connecting, and the world stopped spinning. He was breathing heavily. Undoubtedly from the exercise, not from seeing her.

She could sense that there was something different about him. It was as if he had grown taller, his shoulders straight, his head high.

And he was going away.

She shivered despite the sun’s heat.

“Are you going somewhere?” she said.

How dumb. Out of all things she could say, she said that?

He watched her with an expression of disbelief, as if he thought exactly the same. She blushed.

“Yes,” he said. “I am.”

Rachel’s hands shook. She’d hoped they’d connect again like before once they saw each other, as if nothing existed but them.

But something was wrong.

She walked towards him, her thick-soled winter boots thumping softly against the wood of the pier.

He watched her with a frown, his chest rising and falling, but did not move. No sign of joy, no movement towards her.

Had he forgotten her? Had he met someone else?

The thought stabbed her like a blade to the stomach, and she almost doubled up.

“Where are you going?” she asked, stopping in front of him. She slid the heavy backpack she was carrying from her shoulder. It held all the treasure she had promised, and more.

His warmth radiated and tickled her skin. Her lips itched to kiss him, her hands almost lifting to touch his beard, to feel his strong body under her fingertips. Her body swung slightly towards him, as if drawn by an invisible magnet, anxious to feel his arms pulling her into his warm embrace.

But he stood still as a mountain, piercing her with his hazel eyes.

“On a raid. To Pictland.”

“Oh. Scotland. For how long?”

“Until the ships are full with treasure.”

“Won’t your wife miss you?” The word “wife” broke in half like a dry twig.

He blinked. “No.”

Rachel nodded. “Do you have a wife?”

“No.”

She let out a laugh, relief slipping through the nervous smile on her face.

“How long have I been gone?”

“Half a year,” he said, then added so softly, almost in a whisper, “Are you really here?”

Tension evaporated from Rachel’s forehead. “Yes,” she said. “I really am.”

She reached out and took his left hand in both of hers. She was afraid he’d jerk it away or reject her in some other way. But once her palms reached his, he squeezed her fingers and looked down. Then he slowly drew her hands towards his face and studied them carefully, and her skin burned.

His palm was warm and dry, his skin calloused and rough, and pleasant heat spread through her.

Then he pressed them against his lips, his wet touch sending tingles through her, his eyes closing, the skin around them wrinkling. He held her hands like this for a long while, and Rachel’s worry started melting away, her stomach unclenching, her lungs expanding.

He was not indifferent. A tear rolled down her cheek.

“It’s really you,” he whispered against her fingers, warming them with his breath. “I can feel your hand. It’s as soft as I remember. I thought I’d never see you again.”

Rachel could not stand a second more of not being in his arms. She stepped towards him, and he opened himself to her. And once she was in his arms, the world stood still again.

Her hands closed behind his back. His smell enveloped her: the sea, the sun, his fresh sweat. She inhaled it as if it were oxygen she needed to stay alive. She heard his heartbeat under her ear, beating as fast as her own.

“Why are you here?” She felt Kolbjorn’s words warm against her ear, the very sound of his voice making her knees weak.

“I’m back,” she said, still not letting him go. But he leaned back and studied her.

“Back?”

She swallowed. This was the hard part. To tell him that she had no intention of returning to her own time. To open her heart to him, to put it at his mercy.

“Yeah. For good. If you’ll have me,” she added.

Kolbjorn’s eyes widened. “What of your mother?”

Rachel smiled broadly. “She’s well, thanks to you. Thanks to the necklace.”

Kolbjorn’s shoulders relaxed. “That is good news. How did you come back?”

“Well. I did not have the golden spindle anymore. So I had to look for the Norn. It was not easy, mind you. In Chicago, those who follow pagan culture celebrate the Jul festival, and that was where I found her. She said she enjoyed our story the most and thought that I’d come find her earlier. You were right—she knew everything. And she said I should get my things and she’d send me back, but for the last time. I wouldn’t be able to return to my time anymore.”

Kolbjorn eyes widened. “You won’t?”

“No, I’m stuck here. I came here to redeem myself, and I brought this wergild, I suppose.” She lifted the backpack. “There’s wine and hot dogs, painkillers and medicine that kills infections—rot-wounds. And there are more gemstones—synthetic ones, like the sapphires. Will you accept this as wergild for my theft?”

“No.”

Rachel’s heart sank. “Why not? I can also assist the jewelry master until my debt is paid.”

He shook his head. “This is not good enough, Rachel.”

“What else can I do?”

“I’ll accept you here, allow you to work with the jewelry master and accept your wergild”—he nodded towards the backpack—“under one condition.”

“What?”

“That you’ll be my wife.”

Rachel opened her mouth but not a word came out. Had she heard him right? Had he just proposed? Her mouth went dry.

She slapped his chest slightly with her hand and smiled. “So you do have a trickster inside of you.”

He only cocked his head. “What do you say? Do you want to be a jarl’s wife?”

“A jarl’s wife? Are you a jarl now?”

“I am.”

“That means he accepted you?”

He nodded.

“He would be a fool if he hadn’t. Wait. If you are a jarl, where is your father?”

“He died this winter.”

Her heart squeezed for him. He had now lost both of his parents. Rachel pressed her face against his chest. “I am so sorry, Kolbjorn!”

She looked up and studied his face, and, as usual, he looked stoically at her.

“Will you not need an honorable wife as a jarl?”

“I no longer care what anyone thinks. You were right. I needed to live by my own rules. And as soon as I started, I got everything I had ever wanted. Except the thing I wanted most. You.”

Rachel smiled softly, feeling their souls connect on some level she could not grasp.

“You will be a good partner. You brought treasures and medicine, and you are ready to redeem yourself. Which you will do, don’t get me wrong. You must return what you stole in some way or another. The love and dedication that you showed to your mother, that you showed to me, by coming back here—with the wergild—tells me that you will be the best partner any man could hope for. What do you say?”

There was one thing she had to know before she’d commit to him.

“I said something before I left. Do you remember?”

“I remember.”

He traced his fingers down her cheek gently, the caress sending waves of sweet anticipation through her skin. She leaned into his touch slightly.

“What did I say?”

“That you loved me.” His thumb slid down to her mouth and he traced her lip gently, igniting her skin.

“So before I give my answer to you,” she said, seeing his pupils dilate while he watched her lip move under his thumb. “I need to know. Do you love me?”

He brought his gaze back to hers, their eyes locking as they had the first time they met. His hands went to his neck, and he removed something from under his tunic. It was the necklace that Rachel’s mother made for her, that she had left with Jarl Bjorn. She touched it with her fingers and noticed it held the warmth of his body. Tears welled in her eyes. He’d kept it with him, next to his heart, all along.

“I do. With every drop of my blood, with every part of my soul, with every corner of my heart. I love you, my time traveler.”

His words melted the last bits of tension within Rachel like fire melted snow, and she allowed herself the broadest, happiest smile of her life.

“Then I will marry you, my Viking.”

She reached up for him and finally claimed the lips she had been craving to kiss for so long. He took her mouth hungrily, as if he feared that the next second she’d be gone, and he needed to take everything he could get. He lifted her with his hands, her legs wrapping around his thighs, her sex pressed against his rock-hard erection, sending waves of pleasure through her as he began walking.

“I must have you,” he growled against her mouth. “Life robbed me of you, and I must replenish all the time I have lost.”

Rachel looked down as he stepped over the hull of the longship. “What? Right here?”

He walked to the furthest corner of the ship, where the piles of sacks and barrels stood. The bottom shifted, making Rachel’s head spin even more and adding to the burning through her whole body. He sank to his knees together with her right behind a little hill of goods.

“Yes. Here. Anywhere.”

They sank to the bottom, shielded now from any prying eyes from the village, and as Kolbjorn’s lips found Rachel’s again, she melted in his strong arms and they breathed and moved as one. Finally, Rachel felt complete, and as she gazed into Kolbjorn’s warm eyes, she knew he felt it, too.