I couldn’t help it, when he woke up I was sitting over him breathless with excitement. “Hi.”

“Good mornin’, mo reul-iuil.”

“You’re home. I can’t believe it. You’re really home. I mean, I knew you were trying, but you actually did it.”

“I canna believe it either, though it took enough pain of me. I am verra glad tae be.”

I bounced on the bed. Looking him in the eyes, not wanting the moment, him, waking up, home, finally — to ever end.

“I’m literally so excited I don’t think I slept for the last four hours.”

“What time is it? What day?”

“It’s June 10th.” I glanced over at the clock on the side table. “Six-forty-five.”

“I have the grime of centuries on me, want tae take a shower?”

“God, yes.”

I energetically jumped from the bed and bounded across the room. I looked back and Magnus was smiling. “What are you waiting for?”

“I am nae waiting, I am watching. Your ass in your panties leaping across the room. Tis quite spectacular.”

I grinned. “In one half second it will be — wait, right now.” I dropped my panties to the ground, wiggled my butt cheeks at him, and ran into the bathroom giggling. Magnus, my Magnus, jumped from bed and followed a step behind.

I started the shower while he stripped his clothes to the floor. Steamy hot. I pulled my shirt off over my head, tossed it to the side, and then led him by the hand into our shower. He held his breath, ducked into the water, said, “phwesha!” and shook like a dog, sprinkling water around the stall.

I filled my hand with shampoo, and he dutifully leaned forward. I scrubbed his hair massaging in circles as he groaned.

“When did ye know I was coming home?”

“I had been back for a day. I was sleeping on the couch. Hayley was here, because long story, and I woke up and had a new memory, you, in Los Angeles.”

“It worked then? Did ye keep it that long?”

“Yes it worked. I did. I can’t explain why, but I kept it.”

I took the handle off the shower wall and sprayed his head. Soap bubbles poured down his skin. He asked, “What did ye think of me in Los Angeles?”

“I thought you were hot and mysterious. What did you think of Los Angeles me?”

“I thought ye were the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. I also thought I might shove a knife point into the man ye were with and save ye the trouble, but I believed ye might nae fall in love with me after.”

“I’m super glad you had second thoughts.”

“Me too, mo reul-iuil.” He tipped up my chin and looked down into my eyes. “You ran because I told ye tae.”

“I did, I ran.”

“Twas the first time I thought we might survive these travails. I have been thinking on this for many a day. If ye trusted me tae do it against your own strong will, I had tae be smart and keep journeying’ tae get home. It made me think afore I shoved knives intae scoundrels.”

I lathered soap all over his shoulders. “So I was like your North Star?”

“Och aye.”

”Turn around.” I lathered his back. The whip marks were healed mostly, becoming stripes of scars. Most of them ugly, a few of them very, very ugly. I kissed one and lathered under his arms and down his waist and around his buttocks.

“I dinna think I could love ye more but when ye hit Lord Delapointe and ran, I was verra proud of ye. It made me know, truly know, that ye were everything tae me. As if I found ye on purpose because we were meant tae be.”

I pushed his shoulder, so he turned to face me. “If you keep talking like that you’ll make me cry, and there has been too much of that. We are having a happy shower. No tears, either happy or sad.”

“Still, I was verra proud, needed tae be said,” He grinned and lathered soap on my breasts.

I moaned. “Good, I’m glad that moment was an epiphany for you, because I don’t know if I could ever do it again. Leaving you took all the strength I have. I don’t want to do that anymore.”

His strong hands pulled me close to his front and then without much ceremony at all he set his stance firm and lifted me from the ground. But I climbed him too, wrapping my legs around his waist. I held onto his steaming wet shoulders. And because it had been too long, too, too long — he was inside me fast, and around me, desperate and fast and with oh so much desperate longing and quick because it needed to happen quickly, at once. Now. Because oh my god, it had been so long. . .

I held on around his shoulders. Slippery shoulders — “don’t drop me” — His breath beside my ear. “I winna let go” — wide and strong and hard and — I pressed my nose to his shoulder and inhaled the scent of him mingled with the water — my back pushed to the glass. His hips slamming against mine. Steam surrounding us. Shampoo scents lingering in the air. My moans against his wet skin.

In the end he slid from inside me as I slid from his hands down his front to my feet. I landed, and wrapped my arms around his chest and tucked my head there. His arms around. He kissed the edge of my hair, inhaled and his arms went tighter. I held on. I pressed against him like my life depended on it. And felt him solid, alive, real.

Steam rose all around us and many long moments passed. I wouldn’t let go. He wouldn’t. It was a promise, and the longer we held the more it meant. Finally another kiss to my forehead and we broke our embrace.

He scrubbed his hands up and down on his face and grinned. “You told me once it was uncomfortable tae do in a shower. I think the end result may be worth the difficulties.”

I lathered up my hair. “True. We could also install a seat that would make it less acrobatic?”

“But then ye winna have tae climb me.”

I raised the shower handle to rinse my hair and grinned. “You liked that, huh?”

“I did.”

“Good, me too.”

He kissed me on the nose. “I am hungry enough tae eat a bear. What magic has Chef Zach whipped up, ye think?”

“Probably pancakes or something. I heard him up early. It must be something special.”

“Tis all special when I am half-starved. He has a bairn?”

“Yes, a boy. He and Emma named him Ben. He’s three weeks old.”

“Tis a full house when a bairn is in residence.”

“Also, my grandma, Barbara—“

“Madame Barb is here?”

“She is, I brought her—“

“Och aye, tis good news. . . ”

I smiled broadly. “There aren’t many men who would be thrilled by the idea of a grandmother moving into their house.”

“Are ye telling me one of your jokes? Madame Barb is wonderful. When I lived there, I understood where ye got your wit. She would banter with a spark in her eye much like your own. Twas hard tae believe I would ever get tae see ye again — you hadna been born yet, but being around Madame Barbara was comfortable, like being home with ye. She is so wise about — you are joking?”

I watched him for a beat, my heart soaring from the sight of him, the sound of his words, the feel of his hands. “You know — yes, she’s here. I applied to get her in an assisted-living home, and she’s moving there on Monday. You can help us move her.”

“It’s close?”

“Just down the street.”

“Good.”

“Her memory is terrible, but she remembers you really well.”

“Like twas yesterday.” He grinned, finished toweling off, and left for the bedroom to put on clothes while I finished my shower. A moment later he stuck his head back into the bathroom. “Tis waffles, mo reul-iuil. Chef Zach has declared them ready.”