The plane erupted with cheers, but Astaroth didn’t hear them. He was lost in a new world comprised of him and Calladia and all the possibilities that awaited them.
The fight. The laughter.
The love.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
There are so many people who have helped shape this book into its final, gloriously horny, and chaotic form. Thank you first and foremost to Cindy Hwang for taking on these books and encouraging me to be as weird as I want. Thank you to the Penguin Random House team: Jessica Mangicaro, Stephanie Felty, Angela Kim, and Stacy Edwards. You’re the dream team when it comes to getting this book in readers’ hands, and I’m so grateful for your hard work. Thank you to copyeditor Shana Jones for fixing my commas and fielding my incessant questions about how to balance a British protagonist with an American narrative voice, and thank you to artist Jess Miller and art director Katie Anderson for yet another phenomenal cover. The Gollancz team is wonderful, too: Thank you so much to ?ine Feeney, Javerya Iqbal, Jenna Petts, Tawanna Sullivan, Jessica Hart, and Dawn Cooper （who illustrated the gorgeous UK cover）。 And thank you as always to Jessica Watterson, agent extraordinaire, for being the absolute best and fielding all sorts of panicked or strange inquiries from me.
In my personal life, I’m lucky to know many supportive, creative, kind, and talented people. Thank you to everyone who’s cheered me on in this journey: Sarah Tarkoff, Blaise Nutter, John Moore, Jon Jandoc, Bronwyn Beck, Amanda Powers, Brittany Hoirup, Dan Duncan, Rachel Kitzmann, Julie Verive, Meredith Berg, Angela Serranzana, Mish Kriz, Alycia Francis, Ryan and Tina Porterhawk （plus Austin and Asami, the corgi who gives no fucks in any universe’s dog park）， and a million more people. （Sorry if I missed anyone—writing acknowledgments is stressful!） Thank you to the Berkletes, the Wicked Wallflowers Coven, the SDLA Sisters （Ali, Thea, Kirsten, and Katie, who was also my Taylor Swift advisor）， and the Words are Hard crew （Celia, Rebecca, Julie, Victoria, Jenna, Kate, and Claire）。 Thank you to Village Books and Paper Dreams and the Bellingham Barnes & Noble for all the support, Waterstones Liverpool for the delightful TikToks, and every podcast or website that has invited me to come be my odd self and talk about books.
I’m so grateful for my wonderful family: Mom, Dad, Steve, Mahina, Kennebeck, Lynnea, Nana, Bill, Sandy, and everyone else, with a special shout-out to Cory and Laura for their enthusiastic assault on the little free libraries of Victoria, British Columbia. Thank you to Joy for the years of love, laughter, and thoughtful art; the pens I use to sign and annotate books came from you and I think about you when I use them.
On a more serious note: If you are experiencing or have experienced a relationship like the one Calladia had with Sam, I want to tell you （A） you are not alone and （B） you deserve someone who loves you as you are and will lift you up, not cut you down. You aren’t weak or unworthy if someone has abused you verbally, emotionally, financially, physically, or sexually. If you are currently in a situation where you feel unsafe or scared or need to get out but aren’t sure how, there are resources that can help. I’m American, so I’ll share our National Domestic Violence Hotline: 1-800-799-SAFE （7233）， thehotline.org, or text START to 88788.
Wherever you are, whoever you are, you deserve better. You deserve the best.
Now back to the gratitude, because if there’s any message I want readers to take away, it’s that we all deserve joy. This book is one of my joys.
There are many other people and places that have shaped this narrative. Thank you to Dorothy Dunnett for creating Francis Crawford of Lymond, the gold standard of blond, snarky, morally dubious British literary heroes who my heart seized on many years past and has never let go of. Thank you to True Blood for introducing me to （blond, snarky, morally dubious if sadly not British） Eric Northman and a delicious amnesia plotline, and thank you to Meredith Duran’s A Lady’s Code of Misconduct for aiding me in crafting my first amnesia romance. （Why did I do this to myself??? Goodness, that was hard, and thank you to every medical professional who reads this book and forgives me for questionable medical accuracy.） I’m also grateful to my local kickboxing studio for teaching me how to punch things. Thanks to everyone I met while attending the University of Sheffield for teaching me British slang and making me feel welcome when I was lonely and out of my element far from home, and here’s to the Red Deer as it was when the archaeology folks were hanging out there after class. Cheers to the venues that host my writing sessions on the weekends today—these books wouldn’t exist without you.