“Are you trying to punish me?” I asked once we were alone.
Confusion wrinkled his face. “Why would you say that?”
I waved my hand at the door Felda just walked through.
“She’s excellent at her job, and she cares about you.” He handed me the bowl of stew from the bedside table.
“She has an interesting way of showing care,” I said, eating a few spoonfuls of the beef and carrot stew. The recipe would normally call for potatoes, but with the current disease killing our potato crops, the Citadel was rationing like the rest of the Territory.
“Believe it or not, she’s been known to give hugs every once in a while.”
I nearly spat out my broth. “Now you’re just lying.”
“That’s quite the accusation.” He leaned in, the scent of leather and musk curling around me. “I’ve received one or two of her hugs myself.”
The spoon paused halfway to my mouth. So many things about that statement were unexpected. One, that Felda gave hugs. Two, that a Princeps allowed himself to be hugged by achambermaid. And three, that Felda would willingly offer one of her rare hugs to a man most Territories feared.
Reading my face, he said, “You don’t believe me.”
“No sane person would believe what you just said.”
His cheeks wrestled with a smile. “Seems like you’re making baseless assumptions.”
“They aren’t baseless. They’re grounded in evidence. Felda is as prickly as North, and you’re not the type to go around requesting hugs.”
“Are you saying I don’t like hugs?”
“You remove criminals’ body parts when they talk back to you.” Among a variety of other dangerous tendencies.
“That may be true.” He brought a finger to his lips, drawing my attention to where it didn’t need to go. “But need I remind you thatwehugged just a few days ago?”
Okay, so we were going to talk about that incredibly intimate moment. I would have expected him to sweep it under the rug, but he didn’t.
“That wasn’t a hug.”
“Wasn’t it? My arms were around you, holding you to my chest. If not a hug, then what would you consider that?” he challenged.
“A…hold.” Then a kiss.
A kiss which he was currently remembering, because he glanced at my lips.
A kiss that I was not going to overthink because there was too much to untangle there. It’d been a kiss of comfort, and that was all.
“If I’m willing to hold you, why wouldn’t I accept a simple hug from a motherly old woman?”
I really couldn’t believe I was having this conversation with a man renowned for his violence. “This is a ridiculous conversation.”
He smirked. “So you admit defeat.”
“No, I don’t. But my stew is getting cold, and I’m trying to end this conversation so I can eat,” I snapped. “Why are you here, anyway?”
Harthon hadn’t spent any time with me after he carried me here from his bedroom. According to Callen, he was busy determining who was behind my attack and making plans to get to First Territory once I recovered. But I did know he’d been checking up on me frequently, asking for reports.
I’ll admit that part of me thought he’d been avoiding me after our kiss, but considering he just brought it up, he didn’t seem keen on forgetting it.
“Demanding,” he commented. “Yet again, you seem to forget who is in charge.”
“Sir Princeps Harthon. Your Grace. Your Eminence. Would you so kindly do me the honor of informing me why you are within this room?”
