I frowned. “What do you mean?”
He met my eyes. “Maybe you collect what you are. Not something broken, but something shaped by time, softened by hardship. A thing discarded that still catches light.”
No one had looked at the pieces I’d hidden and called them beautiful. No one had made me feel seen without stripping me bare. His words slid under my skin like they belonged there.
I didn’t ask if he talked like this with others because I didn’t want to know. But something in his voice made me think he didn’t.
“I like that about you,” he said.
Warmth bloomed in my chest, both wonderful and terrifying. I liked this version of him too, the one who saw things clearly, who didn’t push or pry or mock. The one who sat with me in the firelight and asked about who I was, not who everyone thought I must be.
And it was a problem. Because now, he didn’t feel like the enemy at all.
I didn’t know when the silence turned from charged to unbearable.
We were still sitting too close on the sofa, my legs brushing his. The fire had burned down low, casting everything in copper and shadow, but he didn’t move to light torches.
His eyes were on me—no,inme—as if he could read thoughts I hadn’t dared whisper. The world felt breathless, narrowed to the curve of his shoulder, the twitch of his jaw, and the way his gaze moved to my mouth and lingered there.
“You surprise me,” he said quietly, his voice husky.
I swallowed. “Why?”
“You make me want to ask questions I have no right knowing the answer to.” His eyes found mine again. “And you make me want to hear the truth.”
He leaned in, slowly, giving me time to retreat.
I didn’t. Even if I’d wanted to, I wasn’t sure I could’ve moved. My body felt caught, strung between a heartbeat and breath, between fear and something perilously close to longing.
His hand came up to rest against my cheek, and his thumb traced across my skin.
“If I kiss you now,” he asked, “will you regret it?”
Yes, I thought. And no.
And fates,please.
I leaned toward him while my mind screamed for me to run. The war in my blood told me this was dangerous, stupid even. But I was tired of feeling cold, tired of being made of stone. I didn’t want to be strong in this moment. I wanted to feel.
Wantedhim.
Not the king. Not the rebel. Just Trew.
If regret was the cost, I’d pay it in full.
I was all tension and heat and second thoughts. But he was steady. Soft, somehow, in a way that made my heart stutter.
When I didn’t pull away, he closed the last breath between us.
And he kissed me.
The beginning came slow. Testing. His mouth brushed mine, feather-light, giving me one last chance to change my mind. Then he deepened the kiss. His lips tasted of the sweets he’d savored almost as much as he appeared to be savoring me.
I exhaled into him, gliding my fingertips across his unbandaged skin.
He was softer than a hard man should be.
I’d craved this so much.
