For him, the woman in his arms had been absent for almost an entire year, and the difference sat so openly inside his expression when he finally pulled back that Melissa felt happiness surge through her with almost painful force.
Her eyes burned, her chest tightened, and suddenly the fact that he was here, alive, warm, holding her, looking at her like he had crossed an age just to come home became too much for the composure she had been carrying.
Melissa touched his face with both hands; her palms settled against his cheeks as though she needed to feel him properly before believing anything else. Her gaze moved greedily over the white hair, the familiar amethyst eyes carrying depths of gold deeper than she remembered them before he left, the face she knew better than almost any face in the world, and Phei barely had time to smile before she kissed him.
That ruined whatever remained of his restraint—
