It didn’t last long before the need to cough spurred me to pull away. I hacked into the crook of my arm and turned onto my side while a dizzy spell swept over me. The discomfort was fleeting, but worth what had sparked it.
Kit massaged up my back, then snuggled in to curve his body against mine and loop his arm around my waist.
He kissed behind my ear before whispering, “You’ve changed me, you know. For the better, I think.”
My eyelids were heavy, and I realized I’d done a better job of exhausting myself than Kit. It was a struggle to keep them open as I stared out at the room that had so recently become ours.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
Kit’s chest swelled with a deep breath. “Those things you said about me? What you see in me?”
He paused, and I hummed an encouraging sound.
“I’m not sure they were true, before you.”
His arm hugged tighter around me, and I grabbed onto it, wanting to keep him close.
Kit’s voice was a rumble in my ear as he continued. “I’ve spent all this time believing I’m not a good person, wondering how you could want to be with me. For years, I hated myself. Sometimes I still do, but less now, because of you.”
It was too much to hear and not see him. I shifted away while craning my neck to find his face. His brows were drawn together, and his eyes were soft beneath them in a wistful sort of look.
“Kit, I love you,” I told him. I couldn’t say it enough.
He smiled, and the whole room felt warm and wonderful.
“I love you, too, Pen, in a way I never thought possible.” He stroked my cheek again, and I caught his hand to hold in mine. He looked down at our entwined fingers as he added quietly, “You’ve made me a better man. A happier one.”
It was all I wanted for him. To banish his doubt and sorrow and fear and leave him as full of joy and hope as I was. Becausehe’dmade me that way. It was strange to think that, while I was learning how dark and frighteningthe world could be, I was learning, too, how good it felt not to be alone in it.
I had begun to doze when Kit gently stirred me. “We should wash up,” he said. “I’ll fill the tub if you want to wait here.”
I nodded, feeling weighted to the bed and drowsier by the second. No sooner did I feel the chill of Kit sliding away than did he return, this time standing over me while rubbing my arm. Peeling my eyes open, I gazed up at him, this darling man I could call mine.
“You ready, sweetheart?” he asked.
The pet name filled my stomach with butterflies.
I crawled off the bed and stumbled into him, and was immediately wrapped up, held, safe, andloved.
And it was perfect.
37
Kit
Leaving Penny at home the next morning was one of the hardest things I’d ever done.
We slept late, both dozy and pleasantly spent after our roll in the proverbial hay, and breakfast had been a drawn-out affair. It mostly consisted of Penny sitting in my lap and doing his best to distract me from the mound of scrambled eggs on my plate. It was only my admission of lingering soreness that put a stop to his attempt at a repeat performance right there on the kitchen table. He left me to my food, then, and when I managed to drag myself away to pull on my boots and my cloak, I backed out the door so that his blissful smile was the last thing I saw before I headed for the forge.
A frigid wind strafed the bowl of the corrie, whipping up the snow and shrieking through the narrow alleys and quiet lanes. It set my teeth to chattering before I even made it off the front step. I was glad to have the excuse of Penny still needing time to recover from the hemlock to keep him in where it was warm. I’d instructed him to spend the dayresting, but I knew better. He’d get bored of being still long before I got home.
There was no one shopping in the market when I arrived. Many of the vendors’ stalls were shuttered and heaped with fresh snow, leaving the meat merchant, the candlemaker, Rosie’s mother, and me as the only people brave—or foolish—enough to have left home to work in such weather. Briefly, an old man scurried from the tavern to the bakery stand, where Rosie’s mother was bundled so snugly in furs that I almost didn’t recognize her. He purchased a pastry, then scuttled out of the square. I’d have given anything to turn right back and head home myself.
Unfortunately, I had orders to finish.
It took some effort to get the coals lit and keep them from flaring up too much with the wind, but before long, the shop was warm enough for me to shed my cloak and pull on my apron and gloves.
I didn’t have the desire or the energy to work on anything strenuous, so I set to work crafting iron nails for the farrier. It was a job I could do practically with my eyes closed, and I didn’t have to feel guilty when my mind inevitably wandered.
