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His green lips curve into a smile that pushes his thick tusk teeth higher up his sculpted cheeks, making him even more attractive, impossible as that should be. “No judgment here. I’ll sit, and I’ll join you for a glass of fermented grape juice.” He settles on my couch, looking as if he belongs there, the same as all the times he sat there before.

“Did this change come with being a world-famous rock star? You never used to consume alcohol.”

“Still don’t, as a rule.”

The second tumbler sits on the island in front of me, but I pause pouring and meet his gaze. “Don’t break your rules on my account. I’m comfortable going solo.”

One of his dark eyebrows rises. “Some things are more enjoyable when they’re shared with another person, don’t you think?”

One sexy innuendo from Grüsh and my body switches from stressed-out to sizzle. The flare of his nostrils tells me he knows it, too. Damn him. And damn me for being putty in his strong, green, talented hands. Six years apart and all the effort I put intobuilding walls around myself is no match for our chemistry. Our connection.

“Decided against wine?” he asks when I take another empty cup from the cupboard, cap the wine and return it to the fridge, then fill two glasses with cucumber water from a pitcher.

“It’s hard enough to concentrate around you.” I roll my eyes when his twinkle while his chest expands beyond its usual impressive broadness. “Tone down the smug or you might get this water in shower form.”

His deep rumble of amusement sounds natural and at home in this space. When we were together before integration, he would come and go from my apartment under the cover of darkness, sometimes staying for stretches of days at a time without leaving. I’d work downstairs in the bar during the evening, but all the other hours were spent together. Talking, cooking, eating, watching TV, cuddling, sleeping, making music of the literal and nonliteral kind. Couple things. No amount of time together ever felt like too much. I thought it, we, would last forever.

His attention stays on me as I cross the space toward him. “Thank you,” he says as I hand off his glass, the brief grazing of fingers sending another wave of warmth through me. Even as he brings the tumbler to his lips and tips it to take a mouthful, his eyes remain locked on my face.

Taking the chair on the opposite side of the coffee table, I swallow half my drink—the cool water having zero effect on my internal heat—before cradling my glass between both hands. My carefully cultivated control has abandoned me. Giving in to the infinite spark between us would be so easy. Definitely more enjoyable than continuing the conversation he started at the hospital. But it needs finishing. If not now, then later. And the more intimacy we share before the inevitable end, the more painful that ending will be.

“If you loved me so much, why did you stay away all this time? Why did it take your brother getting married for you to come back?”

All traces of amusement fade from his face. “You shut me out of your life without warning or explanation. Ignored all my attempts at communication for three years. You were never someone to play games, so eventually, I took your actions the way I assumed you intended—seriously. Is that not what you wanted?”

Gripping the glass tightly, I take a drink to wash down the ball emotions lodged in my throat. “It was for the best.”

“For you, maybe.”

“Not for me, Grüsh. For you.”

He leans forward, sets his glass on a coaster. Stares into my eyes as if he’ll find answers there that he’s not getting from my lips. Releasing a long breath, he sits back, pushing his fingers through the section of thick, longer hair on the top of his head.

I’ve spent six years focused on my pain, my losses. In doing so, I denied him real closure. “The way I ended things wasn’t fair to you. I know that now, and I’m sorry. I didn’t want to hold you back. I wanted you to have every amazing thing imaginable in your life, and that wouldn’t have been possible if I stayed in the picture.”

“Because going after a career in the industry meant I’d want a life of wild times and meaningless moments?” A disgusted huff pushes through the thin line his lips have formed. “You knew me better than anyone, Cate. You knew I wasn’t interested in any of that shit. I’ve only ever wanted two things out of life—my music and my mate.”

Mate.The word is like a dagger to my heart. It’s the reason I did what I did. I abandon my seat and walk to the kitchen, willing the tears currently threatening to break through the dam to retreat. Filling my glass doesn’t take enough time topull myself together. My vision is still blurry when I close the refrigerator door. I can’t face him like this.

His footsteps on the old wood floor punctuate the silence. Then he’s standing behind me, gently massaging my shoulders. “My tone was frustration, not anger. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“I know.”

Warmth from his hands seeps through the thin fabric of my shirt, and when he slides his palms down my arms, I force myself to turn and look up at him.

“Before integration, long before I met Ogram, you told me about his near-desperate yearning to find his mate, and how your parents had taught you both to follow the urge to travel because it would be instinct guiding you to your true mate. You talked about your younger brother’s frustration at not having the desire to leave the area. In hindsight, that makes sense because Ogram had to be in Harmony Glen for Hope’s arrival. He didn’t have to go out and find his true mate; he just had to wait for her. But it was never lost on me thatyouwanted to leave.”

His strong brow descends, a frown tugging at his green lips. “Because I dreamed of an opportunity to share music with an audience. Not to find my true mate.”

“It could have been both.”

“It wasn’t. If I’d had an overwhelming urge to leave because my mate was out there somewhere, I wouldn’t have stayed in the area; I would’ve followed it in secret, just like my father did when he was young, just like Ogram would have. The difference between Ogram and I was that not having that urge to find my mate didn’t bother me. Then I met you and I understood why my brother wanted to find his mate, because I’d found mine. Or, more accurately, she’d found me.”

My heart wants it to be true. So badly. “I can’t be your mate.”

“I used to believe that. Rutting with you, even when your scent indicated you were fertile, I never experienced breedingurges, as my father explained were part of the rut when I reached maturity. I was taught that procreation is innately tied to troll mating, so I convinced myself you couldn’t be my true mate if my mind wasn’t filled with thoughts of impregnating you. I assumed trolls and humans weren’t genetically compatible that way.”

I don’t respond. I can’t. If I speak, the last thread of self-control I’m clinging to will snap. All I manage is a nod.