She touched her lips to his before he could answer, the kiss a gentle thing. It was so strange, how powerful touch could be. She could keep this big man in place with a butterfly caress. Once, she’d have taken it as a sign of weakness on his part, power on hers. That was before she understood the touch would have as deep an impact on her, that she’d do anything to make him smile, make him feel pleasure.
Today he shuddered, this strong bear who had hands twice as big as her own, and whose physical strength dwarfed hers many times over. “You’ll lose me,” she said because she had to prepare him for the hurt she might inflict. “The surgeon believes there’s a seventy-five-percent chance of success—”
Valentin’s face cracked into a huge smile. “Damn that’s good.”
“There’s also a very high chance that the operation will permanently deaden the part of me that feels.” Ashaya and Dr. Bashir had come to that conclusion earlier today. “I’ll be gone. You’ll lose me.”
“You’ll lose yourself, too.” Valentin’s voice came out raw. “The woman you are without Silence, the full brightness of you, solnyshko moyo, it’ll be shoved into a small box.”
Silver went motionless; she’d been so worried about him that she hadn’t thought about the consequences to herself. It slammed into her with brutal force. If the surgeon did turn off the part of her that felt, it would permanently turn off a part of her. The part that could hug and tease her brother. The part that could kiss a child’s cheek, the part that felt not only loyalty toward her grandmother, but also a deep, deep love and an unending pride.
The part that loved Valentin until loving him was an essential element of her being.
“Oh.” A shaky sound of acknowledgment.
Powerful arms wrapping around her, a bass heartbeat against her cheek. “I’ll die,” she whispered. “Part of me, a part I’ve barely had the chance to explore, it’ll die.”
“But you’ll live.” Her mate’s voice was barely human. “You’ll live and you’ll be Silver Fucking Mercant who owns her enemies and who I’ll get to see shining bright for the rest of my own life.”
Silver blinked back the staggering sense of loss. “I’ll be able to protect my family in the coming decades of uncertainty.” So many lives, so many futures. “And I’ll be there for StoneWater. I vow this. Even if I forget my emotions, I’ll remember the vow. So long as I draw breath, the clan will always have a friend in the Mercants.”
Amber eyes stared into her own, her Valyusha’s forehead pressed to hers. His generous heart deserved to never again feel pain, but she knew he’d endure it because that was who he was. An alpha to the core. A man who would never let her down.
“Silver Fucking Mercant, Ice Queen and my mate. Lyubov moya.” His voice shook on the words of love. “You will be that to me to my dying day. If the worst happens and if you ever need me, call. I’ll be there. I’ll always be there.”
Chapter 39
Death comes in endless forms. Of the body. Of the soul. Of the heart.
THEY’D COME FULL circle, Valentin thought as he sat beside Ena Mercant in the waiting room of the private hospital early the next morning. Once again, he waited to see if Silver would wake up, while beside him sat a regal woman who reminded him too much of the brilliant, driven telepath who was his other half.
“You’ve made a sacrifice.” Ena’s voice was as cool as always, as cool as Silver’s could get when she wanted to make a point.
“Grandmother, I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“My granddaughter holds you in high esteem,” Ena said. “You could’ve convinced her to make a different choice.”
His head snapped toward her. “Hell no! I would’ve never done that!” Gritting his teeth, he rose to his feet, stalked across the small space and back. “We’re talking about her life. If I could give up my own to save hers, I’d do it in a heartbeat.”
Ena’s eyes lifted to his, alpha to alpha. She gave a regal nod right as his bear was starting to rumble in his chest. “Regardless of today’s outcome, I won’t forget what you were to my granddaughter.”
Valentin thrust his hands through his already wildly tumbled hair, fought the urge to pull. Sitting down beside Ena, he did something he probably shouldn’t. He reached out and put his arm around her. She stiffened but didn’t pull away. “She’s magnificent. And she’s ours. We’ll do whatever we have to, to protect her.”
“Yes.”
That was all that needed to be said. They sat in silence until the doors to the operating theatre opened hours later. Ashaya and Amara Aleine walked out together with the surgeon, a fortysomething man of medium height. As expected, Amara broke off to head down the corridor in the opposite direction, while Ashaya and Dr. Edgard Bashir came toward them.
All were dressed in surgical white, though they’d removed the transparent gear that would’ve covered their heads and faces during the operation, as well as all other accoutrements of the surgical suite.
A man with disheveled dark blond hair exited in their wake, jogged to catch up with Amara. Samuel Rain. No one came after him, the nurses still inside.
Valentin and Ena had both risen to their feet at the first sign of the doors being opened. “How is she?” Valentin’s bear wanted to rampage through those doors, grab hold of his Starlight.
“Stable.” Ashaya’s answer made him stagger inside.
“Then why aren’t you smiling?”
Blue-gray eyes held his, sadness swirling in their depths. “I’m sorry, Valentin, but there is a close to hundred percent chance that her Silence will be flawless when she wakes.”
“She’s alive.” That was what mattered. “And she still has her telepathy?” Silver would rather die than lose that.
“Unless there are unforeseen complications,” Dr. Bashir said, “her telepathy should remain unaffected.”
A single curl escaped the bun at Ashaya’s nape to dance against her cheek. “The operation didn’t go exactly as planned.”
Ena stirred. “Explain.”
“We couldn’t cut the link between her audio telepathy and her emotions, couldn’t even see the pathway that appeared to exist in the scans,” Dr. Bashir began, the silver threads in his dark hair glinting in the overhead light. “As a result, we had to isolate the part of her that feels emotion.”
“Dr. Bashir based his surgical intervention on the neural information Amara and I collected during the creation of the chip,” Ashaya added, a fine tension to her jawline. “I just hope we weren’t wrong.”
“There’s no reason to believe that,” the surgeon said firmly. “The logic of the surgery is sound. We effectively sealed off every conduit going from the emotional center of her brain—it’s now an island unconnected to any other part.”
Ashaya’s eyes never left Valentin’s, the understanding in them stark. “Since the—albeit limited—data we have supports the assumption that audio telepathy does not exist in the absence of emotion, I feel confident in saying it’s been neutralized.”
“She’s safe?” It was the only question to which he needed an answer.
Ashaya and Dr. Bashir both nodded.
My mate, my heart’s sun, is safe.
It was Ena who spoke, and she spoke to him. “We knew it was a possibility that Silver might lose her emotions.”
Valentin told her with his eyes that it was all right; he’d do everything in his power to help Starlight through this new part of her life. Even if it was one that meant leaving him behind.