I scoffed and dropped into one of the armchairs in front of the windows. “There were a lot of things back then that were more important to me than this place.” There still were, now.
He chuckled. “Penny is lucky to have you.” His smile faded, and his brows drew down again. “Though I worry it might be hard on you if he's gone half the year working the farm and you're here tending to your duties as Shroud Warden.”
“I'm sure we’ll make it work,” I said. With any luck, this would all be over long before spring planting and it wouldn’t be a concern at all.
Levitt nodded. “I’ll figure something out when it comes time for that. I wouldn’t have you make the kinds ofsacrifices I did.” That sad smile was back again. “I don’t want you to share in my regrets.”
I wouldn’t. I owed Penny apologies for many things, and I wasn’t too proud to throw myself on his mercy. And then, if I was lucky, there would be time for a nap before tonight’s family dinner.
18
Penny
My sketchbook lay open across one knee as I sat on the couch. Most nights, I would have started dinner by now or at least put on coffee in anticipation of Kit’s return from the smithy. But, with his evening committed to my half-brother and his loathsome wife, I figured they could provide food and beverage for a change.
I still needed to eat, though. My stomach protested my decision to skip lunch since I’d been sulking then and ever since, indulging a foul mood over my brother managing to wreak endless havoc on my life. I was far from home and should have been far from him, too, yet he plagued me. From what he’d said, he seemed to feel the same.
The house was still in shambles from the Sentinels’ raid the day before, but I couldn’t be bothered to tidy up. It felt futile. They could barge in again at any moment, for any reason, and wreck the place all over again. The sense of safety I’d had here before was shattered. Now, I wanted to leave and take Kit with me, go somewhere we could be together the way we should be. Unafraid. Unashamed.
When the front door opened, I busied myself with the sketch I’d started at Rosie’s house before the second Oath. I’d thought about revisiting my drawing of Kit. I could fill the details from memory at this point, but I didn’t want to look at him right now. Or talk to him. Which was why, when he tugged off his boots and greeted me, I only grunted in response.
He sighed, and I watched without raising my head as he crossed through to the kitchen where I’d left the dessert he’d asked me to pick up on the dining table. He noticed it immediately and called over.
“This tart looks delicious, Pen. What flavor is it?”
“Lemon,” I replied, then smirked. “Merrick hates sour things. Probably because they remind him too much of himself. But I hope you and Violette enjoy it.”
“And you?” Kit prompted.
I scribbled another line down the edge of the page of my sketchbook, then tipped my pencil to the side to apply a bit of light shading.
“Not going,” I muttered.
Kit returned to the living area to stand with his arms crossed. “Yes, you are.”
I shook my head. “You accepted.Idid not.”
“You can’t avoid this. We have to make some sort of peace.”
My jaw clenched, and I moved my pencil faster, filling what should have been a patch of gray to near black. The lead tip rapidly blunted and, when I pushed harder, it snapped off completely. I sat upright and swore, then closed the sketchbook and flung it and the pencil onto the coffee table. It skidded off the other side and landed openon the dusty floor.
Kit frowned as he bent to retrieve it and set it on the table.
The gesture was not unappreciated, but I was so full of ire it couldn’t help but leak out. “Tell them I’m sick,” I said. “Because I am. Sick of this place, its people, and its rules. I hate it here.” I bit out the words, tense all the way from my feet to my shoulders while my hands coiled into fists.
“I hate it here too,” Kit replied in a quiet voice. “And I’m relatively certain I’ll hate this dinner, but I can’t skip it and neither can you.”
He looked haggard. Shadows of exhaustion ringed his dark eyes, and his features pinched like he was in pain. Guilt nagged at me because we were still fighting, or fighting again after he’d forgiven me for kissing him the day before.
But a kiss shouldn’t require forgiveness. I should have been able to kiss Kit whenever I wanted. He was mine, after all. He even said so, or close enough. We belonged with each other.
He’d been with Levitt just now. Smoothing over the damage he claimed I’d done. I wondered what they’d discussed or said about me. Kit’s impetuous recruit. Brash, petty Penny. Kissing men to prove a point. I’d said I wasn’t that sort of person, jealous and, as Kit pointed out, proprietary. But maybe I was.
My next question came out as a snipe, words that won the race against thought. “Will Levitt be joining us?”
Kit’s brow creased. “Why would he?”
I folded my arms, refusing to back down while becoming increasingly certain I should. “He’s Violette’s brother. That makes him my brother-in-law.”
