The ultimatum was not entirely unexpected, or at least the existence of an ultimatum wasn't. You wouldn't dare, he might have replied. The words were on his tongue and in his eyes as he met hers. But Oz knew how they argued very well at this point, and he would have expected her to have stood her ground when he'd stepped into her path, to deliver her next line standing toe-to-toe with him. She had stepped back. He felt the absence of her in the space where she ought to have been as strongly as the pull of gravity — he was off-balance. She might have meant it.

He held her eyes for a long moment while he tried to find a way around it. He didn't want to cave now, partly because of Sophia but mostly because he had started this fight and didn't want to lose it. But there was nothing for it, because he could never survive a future without her. His voice was thick when he responded, but level: "I swear never to touch her again."

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