Chapter 63

(Emily's POV)

I woke among black sheets and a woodsy scent that consumed every one of my senses. Dimitri sat in a chair beside the bed. His eyes were lowered, and his elbows rested on his knees as he twisted my heart-shaped earring between his thumb and forefinger.

A single turn of the synthetic diamond symbolized our relationship: He held my heart in the palm of his hand, bringing it out to play sometimes before putting it back in his pocket to be forgotten.

He wasn't aware I was awake, and I took the opportunity to view his private moment. Still, in nothing but his briefs, his hair glinted in the sunlight and was mussed as if he'd been running his hands through it all night. He was ink and vengeance and so very human beneath cold, steel armor.

In this wintery Italian fortress, the sight of him created a sharp ache in my chest that threatened to rip me in half.

I wondered if Dimitri's conscience was responsible for him changing his mind about leaving me for dead, or simply the fact