“It’s more complicated than that.”
“Is it?”
Yes,she wanted to say.It’s terrifyingly complicated. He’s an exile. He won’t tell me what he’s running from. We’re temporary guests in his home, and any day now we’ll have to face reality again.
But looking into her sister’s hopeful face, she couldn’t bring herself to voice any of it.
“Maybe,” she admitted instead. “Maybe it doesn’t have to be.”
Dani squeezed her hands. “Good. Because I have a proposal.”
“A proposal?”
“I’ve been thinking about it all morning. Well, for the last few minutes, but I’ve been thinking very hard.” Dani sat up straighter, clearly marshaling her arguments. “I want my own room.”
She blinked. “What?”
“I want the little room. I want to sleep there.”
“Dani, that room is barely bigger than a closet?—”
“I like small spaces. They’re cozy. And I want a place that’s just mine, with my own things arranged the way I want them.” She fixed Jessa with a knowing look. “And you and Tarek should have the big bedroom. Together.”
“That’s not… We can’t just?—”
“Why not?”
A dozen objections crowded her tongue. It was too fast. It was too presumptuous. It wasn’t their home to rearrange.
“Tarek might not want?—”
“What might I not want?”
His voice came from behind her, rough with sleep but undercut with amusement. She spun to find him leaning against the corridor wall, his arms crossed, watching them with those green eyes that seemed to see entirely too much.
“Dani thinks we should… That I should…” She trailed off helplessly. “She wants to switch rooms.”
“I heard.” He pushed off the wall and approached, his bare feet silent on the stone floor. He was wearing only loose trousers, his broad chest on full display, and she had to force herself not to stare at the way the firelight played across his muscles. “The small room for her. The large one for us.”
Us.
The word hung in the air, heavy with implication.
She gave him a look that was half plea, half panic.Help me here. Object. Say something sensible.
Instead, he grinned.
It transformed his face entirely—softening the harsh lines, lighting his eyes with warmth, revealing the flash of those prominent canines in a way that should have been threatening but wasn’t. Not anymore.
“An excellent plan,” he said. “I will help you move your things after breakfast.”
Dani crowed with triumph.
“Wait—” she began.
“The large bed is more comfortable,” he continued, as if she hadn’t spoken. “And there’s more room for… various activities.”
The heat in his gaze made it perfectly clear what activities he meant.
