Before she left, she patted him on the leg. “Girlfriend is here. She help you eat.” She then disappeared through the curtain.
Darien turned toward the still-fluttering curtain. Girlfriend? He didn’t have one, unless Jessica decided that she still cared for him and flew all the way to Japan to see him. Highly unlikely.
The curtain swished aside. All his breath left him in one powerful whoosh. How could it be?
“Hello, Darien.” She smiled that little smile of hers and he felt as if he was falling all over again.
Koori. She was real.
As she moved into the cubicle, he noticed she was wearing jeans and a deep-green V-neck sweater that hugged her curves. Her hair was unbound, cascading over her shoulders and around her pale neck like ebony waves. He’d never seen anyone more beautiful than her.
She slid a hip up onto his bed and touched his arm. The heat from her fingertips warmed every part of his body. Especially his heart. It began to beat again, as if waking from a deep sleep.
“How are you feeling?”
He opened and closed his mouth unable to form any coherent words. He shook his head.
“You’re going to be okay. The doctor says you won’t lose any of your fingers or toes.” She caressed each of his blackened digits. “They just look bad.”
He turned his hand over and caught her fingers in his. The weight and heat of her touch made him ache. “Are you real?”
She smiled. “Yes, Darien. I’m real. I’m here, sitting at your side.”
“I’m not going to wake up from a dream and you’ll be gone forever?”
She shook her head and squeezed his hand tightly to show him how very real she was. “I’m not going anywhere. I’m staying right here with you.”
“I saw you fall.”
“We both fell.”
“I don’t understand. How are we not both dead?”
“The crack in the ground was the way out, Darien. It was the slip between our worlds. When we fell through, we both landed not far from the main road.”
“Why don’t I remember it?”
She lifted his hand up to her mouth and pressed her lips to the back. Her touch was warm, not the cold press he remembered.
“You hit your head during the fall. When we arrived at the road, you were unconscious. The storm had stopped, so I was able to pitch the tent around you for heat, and I ran to the road and flagged down help.”
“We’re out.”
She nodded, her lovely mouth lifting at the corners.
“You’re free?”
“Yes, Darien, I’m free, all because of you.” She shuffled closer to him and leaned down to his face. She pressed a soft kiss to his cheek and murmured against his skin, “You lifted the curse from me. You saved my life.”
“And you saved mine,” he whispered back.
She sat back up and ran her fingers over his cheek, jaw and finally down to his chest. She placed her palm over his heart. “Do you hurt anywhere?”
He shook his head and covered her hand with his. “Not anymore.”
A single tear rolled down her cheek and dripped onto their covered hands. It was warm and real and the most perfect thing he’d ever felt.
“Come here.” He motioned with his chin for her to bend down.
She did, moving slowly, a small smile on her lips. And when she was the barest of breaths away from his mouth, he whispered, “I’m yours forever.”
And then he kissed her.