My naïveté got the best of me, and I cocked my head curiously. “What is that?”
Reiter shook his head. “No. I will not tarnish our friendship by naming what cannot be.”
“Why can’t it be?” I asked. “What is it?”
“No,” Reiter said again, his eyes on the ground as we walked.
“Tell me,” I insisted. “I am going to die anyway.”
“You would think badly of me,” he said.
I frowned. “I do not think that is possible.”
Reiter hesitated before slowly lifting his eyes to meet mine. “I have feelings for you. More than simple friendship.”
My brows furrowed as I tried to parse out the meaning of his words. “What sort of feelings?”
I heard Reiter audibly swallow before he said, “I think… I am beginning to love you.”
The words struck me as if I had suddenly been punched, my heartbeat quickening in my chest. “You what?”
“I love you,” Reiter said again, more forceful this time. “I love you, Ichabod, and I don’t want to lose you.”
My mouth suddenly went very dry. “Do you always feel that way about the sacrifices?” I asked. Reiter had known dozens of people in his time trapped in Sleepy Hollow, and there certainly was nothing unique about me.
“No,” he said. “I have never felt this way toward any of them. But the first time I saw you, I knew that you were special.”
I flushed at that, my fingers curling around the blanket about my shoulders. “Certainly not.”
Reiter frowned. “Do you not believe that you could be special?”
I tried to swallow, but my mouth still felt as dry and heavy as sand. “No one has ever said they loved me before.”
Reiter’s gaze turned very sad. “Not ever?”
“No.”
Reiter looked like that caused him physical pain. He was quiet for a moment before he ventured, “I notice that you did not seem repulsed by my statement.”
I blinked. “I… I’m not,” I said, slightly surprised at myself. It was true that Brom’s crude proposal had repulsed me, but I had never thought that it was because he was a man, merely his brutish and lascivious nature.
Reiter stared at me for a moment. “Do you enjoy the… company of men?”
The question brought heat to my cheeks as I understood that he did not mean mere socializing, but something much more intimate. “I have never been with a man. Or a woman,” I added, lest he think that my proclivities were only toward the fairer sex.
Reiter blinked, his head cocking so far to the side that he nearly dislodged himself from his own grip. “No?”
“No.”
“Are you particularly religious?”
I laughed at that. “Good heavens, no. I grew up with religion, as most people do, but I could not say that I am very religious myself.”
“Then, may I ask why you have not experienced the pleasures of the flesh?” His tone left room for me to deny his request if I wanted, but it wasn’t as if there was anyone he would talk to about me.
“I suppose I have just never really felt the desire for it,” I said. “Not found the right person. Though, I suppose, I will not get the opportunity.”
His face fell just a bit, and I suddenly realized my thoughtless words. “No, I mean… Not that you are not the right person. You could be, I do not really know. I just meant that, if I am to die, I would not have the time to look beyond… you…” My voice trailed off as I realized how completely heartless I must sound.
