She didn’t have to say goodbye.
She. Was. Good. Enough.
Her heart pounded in her chest, hard enough to hurt. Ronan’s hand had grown warm in hers, and she wouldn’t have it any other way. He turned to her with a wide grin.
“I guess we’ll be working together,” he said, nonchalant.
“Is this really happening?” she whispered. Her voice came out different than she intended. Fractured. The weight of the dread that had sat inside her shattering it. She never wanted to wake up from this moment.
The edges of his grin softened into that smile she knew all too well. “It’s happening, Curadh Clíodhna Fionnáin.”
Curadh Clíodhna Fionnáin.
A giddy rush of relief cut through her. She laughed. Her hand had to be cutting off Ronan’s circulation, but he didn’t complain. She wanted to commit this entire moment to memory, so she could live in it forever. She looked at him again, really looked. The way his hair fell into his face, and how his right cheek dimpled, giving him an innocence she’d never noticed. In his eyes were confessions shrouded in an amber haze. Her cheeks burned, but she didn’t dare look away.
Focusing on the truths she was comfortable admitting, she whispered, “You helped me, Curadh Ronan Ó Faoláin.” His name drew a smile to her lips. “I would have never made it this far, if not for everything you’ve done for me.”
He tilted his chin down toward her, as if pulled by an irresistible force. “I may have helped, but remember that this wasyourdoing. It was your drive that led to this. I’m grateful I was able to play a part in it.”
His words nestled into her, making a home where she buried her deepest insecurities.
Without thinking, she wrapped her arms fiercely around him. She expected him to freeze or at least pause before returning the embrace, but he coiled his arms around her back without hesitation. His breath was warm against her neck, sending shivers down her arms. She ignored them and held him tighter.
The boy who showed her how to save herself. The man who had stood beside her.
A throat cleared behind her, pulling them apart.
Reluctantly, she turned to see Niamh and Domhnall. Niamh watched her, but there was something different in her calculating stare. As if she was reassessing. Clía didn’t know what to make of the look, so she met the other woman’s interest with her best impression of her mother’s sweet countenance, the smile she used when she was dealing with a pestering chieftain.
“I guess we’ll be spending a lot of time together in the coming months,” Clía said sweetly.
She couldn’t help but enjoy the uncomfortable silence that blanketed them.
“Yes, it’ll be interesting,” Niamh said carefully.
“I, for one, am looking forward to it. Aren’t you excited to get to know each other better?” She dared Niamh to try to ruin her mood.
But she didn’t try. Instead, the lady turned her gaze to Domhnall. If she was subtly asking the prince to step in, it was a useless request. Under the layers of pompous princeliness, Domhnall was eager to please and prove himself. He fought only battles he believed he could win.
He seemed to squirm under his skin. After how he had beentreating her at Caisleán—after how he’d left her—she couldn’t offer any sympathy.
She looked into his deep green eyes, searching for some evidence of the friendship they’d held before, the feelings she thought he might have harbored. She had once thought his eyes were the color of forests in late summer. Now she saw nothing. She couldn’t find any evidence of the laughter they’d shared or the stories they’d told.
She only saw the insecure gaze of a boy who was desperate to keep in control.
“You once told me I wasn’t strong enough to be your queen,” she said to him, her voice coiled like a snake about to strike. “I hope you realize the truth now. I’m more than a ‘pretty face.’ I’m more than someone you can toss aside like nothing. I am more thanyou.”
Domhnall’s mouth fell open, and she could see him searching to find a way to twist this. To turn her words against her or convince her she was overreacting. She didn’t give him the chance. With a final nod to Ronan, she walked past the rest of the celebrating daltas and left the study.
She only stopped when she was safely in her room, where she let out the squeal of joy she’d been keeping trapped in her chest.
***
CLÍA WAS CONVINCEDSÁRAIT WAS SECRETLY TRYING TOkill her.
That was the only logical reason why she was leading her down hidden stairs, into the depths of the castle.
“After you murder me in cold blood, would you mind pretending I said something wise and serene when facing death?” Clía asked, trying not to focus on the stone walls of the hallway that were definitely closing in on them. Oh gods.
