Chapter 22

Gaius’ POV

I slide my arms to wrap around Avery’s sides and bring her impossibly closer as I dig my face into her hair to inhale her familiar scent. Very soon, our house would scent like this… like the home I always wanted.

“Gaius?”

I incline my head at the sound of my name and hum, “Hmm?”

She hesitates and turns herself around to face me. Her honey eyes shine brighter, not with tears but with myriads of emotions. I glimpse adoration and pure warmth in her gaze, but then there’s also fear seared into those hazel orbs.

My hackles rise instantly at the thought of her being scared of anything, and I open my mouth to demand she tell me what’s bothering her when she cuts me off with a very simple and well-timed question,

“Do you love me?”

My entire body, even my blood, seems to freeze into stone as the question registers in my brain and reaches even deeper to strike a cord within my sense of being.

Do I love her?

That’s as sill